Exponential surge in India's COVID testing; cumulative tests nearing 13.5 cr

With 11,59,032 COVID-19 tests conducted in the last 24 hours, the cumulative tests in India are nearing 13.5 crore (13,48,41,307), the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said on Wednesday.

The Union Health Ministry said in a press release that India has demonstrated a consistent increase in the COVID-19 testing infrastructure since January 2020 resulting in an exponential increase in its testing numbers.

"Comprehensive and widespread testing on a sustained basis has resulted in bringing down the positivity rate. The progressive decline in the national cumulative positivity rate has demonstrated that the rate of spread of infection is being effectively contained. The cumulative positivity rate has been steadily falling and has touched 6.84 per cent today," the release said.

The declining trend of cumulative positivity rate is a testimony of the wide expansion of the country's testing facilities. Meanwhile, the daily positivity rate stands at 3.83 per cent as of Wednesday.

Sustained and progressive expansion in testing infrastructure has played a crucial role in the steep rise of testing numbers. With 2,138 testing labs in the country including 1167 government laboratories and 971 private laboratories, the daily testing capacity has got a substantial boost, it added.As a result of this, tests per million per day in India is five times more than the World Health Orgsation (WHO) standard.

India's present active caseload (4,44,746) is 4.82 per cent of the total positive cases, and has been sustained below the 5 per cent mark, the Ministry said.

The recovery rate continues to be above 93 per cent as 93.72 per cent of all cases have recovered as of date. In the last 24 hours, the country registered 37,816 new recoveries, taking the total recovered cases to 86,42,771.

The gap between recovered cases and active cases is steadily increasing and presently stands at 81,98,025.

As many as 77.53 per cent of the new recoveries are contributed by ten States/UTs.

Kerala leads the tally with 5,149 persons recovering from COVID. Delhi reported 4,943 recoveries, while Maharashtra registered another 4,086 new recoveries in the last 24 hours.

Ten States/Union Territories have contributed 76.51 per cent of the new cases. Delhi has reported the highest with 6,224 cases in the last 24 hours. Maharashtra recorded 5,439 new cases while Kerala reported 5,420 daily cases Tuesday.

A total of 74.22 per cent of the 481 case fatalities reported in the past 24 hours are concentrated in Ten States/Union Territories, the Ministry said.

Delhi with 109 deaths reported the maximum number of new fatalities. Meanwhile, West Bengal saw 49 fatalities followed by Uttar Pradesh with 33 deaths.

( With inputs from ANI )

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