New Delhi
India on Thursday reported record jumps in new coronavirus infections and fatalities with over 4.4 million cases in the country, health ministry figures revealed.
In the last 24 hours, 95,735 new infections were detected, with 1,172 deaths accounting for the highest single-day mortality figures in more than a month, to push the toll beyond 75,000.
Infections are growing faster in India than anywhere else in the world and the United States is the only nation worse affected.
Earlier on Monday, India had outstripped Brazil to become the country with the second-highest number of coronavirus cases after it surged past 4.2 million mark on Monday.
Coronavirus cases in India have crossed 4.4 million and about 3.2 million affected people have been treated so far, the government data showed.
Medical experts had said the country was seeing a second wave of the pandemic in some parts of the country, and that case numbers have surged because of increased testing and the easing of restrictions on public movement.
The worldwide death toll from the coronavirus pandemic jumped past 900,000 since the respiratory disease was first by China last year, an AFP tally showed.
As the fatalities climbed, US President Donald Trump admitted he had tried to minimise the seriousness of the COVID-19 threat at the start of the pandemic, in audio recordings released Wednesday from interviews with veteran journalist Bob Woodward.
“I wanted to always play it down,” Trump told Woodward on March 19, according to a CNN preview of the book “Rage”, due to be published this month.
“I still like playing it down, because I don’t want to create a panic,” he said in the recorded conversation with Woodward.
There have been more than 27.7 million confirmed virus cases worldwide, according to an AFP count based on official statistics, with the worst-hit region Latin America and the Caribbean, followed by Europe.
The country with the most coronavirus deaths is the United States with over 190,000 fatalities, followed by Brazil.
With billions of people around the world still suffering from the fallout of the crisis, a worldwide race for a vaccine is underway, with nine companies already in late-stage Phase 3 trials.—AFP
