Global Covid cases top 193 million

The global Covid-19 caseload has now surpassed 193 million as the highly contagious Delta variant continues to devastate several countries even with mass inoculations underway.

The total caseload and fatalities stand at 193,165,622 and 4,143,105 respectively, as of Saturday morning, according to Johns Hopkins University (JHU).

So far, 3,780,890,033 vaccine doses have been administered across the globe.

The US, which is the world's worst-hit country in terms of both cases and deaths, has so far logged 34,400,655 cases. Besides, 610,720 people have lost their lives in the US to date, as per the JHU data.

Brazil has registered 1,412 more Covid-19 deaths in the past 24 hours, raising its national death toll to 548,340 till Saturday.

As many as 49,757 new cases were detected during the period, taking the total caseload to 19,632,443 the ministry said.

Brazil currently has the world's second-highest pandemic death toll after the United States, and the third-largest caseload after the United States and India.

The third worst-hit country, India's Covid-19 tally rose to 31,293,062 on Saturday as 35,342 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours across the country.

Besides, as many as 483 deaths due to the pandemic since Friday morning took the total death toll to 419,470.

According to AP, India's excess deaths during the pandemic could be a staggering 10 times the official Covid-19 toll, likely making it modern India's worst human tragedy, according to the most comprehensive research yet on the ravages of the virus in the South Asian country.

The report released Tuesday estimated excess deaths — the gap between those recorded and those that would have been expected — to be 3-4.7 million between January 2020 and June 2021. It said an accurate figure may "prove elusive" but the true death toll "is likely to be an order of magnitude greater than the official count."

Situation in Bangladesh

Although the Covid-related deaths dropped to 166 in Bangladesh on Friday from 231 on July 19, the country's health system still remained overwhelmed.   

The country saw the below 200 fatalities for the third straight day.

Also, Covid-19 infections are at 81% of the peak now, with 9,632 new cases reported on an average each day. The highest daily average was recorded on July 15.

Bangladesh recorded 6,364 new infections in 24 hours till Friday morning after testing 20,493 samples.

With Covid's Delta variant spreading fast, the country's fatalities have been hovering at nearly 200 for the past two weeks. It reported the highest daily Covid fatality figure – 231 – on July 19 and 13,768 infections on the 12th of the month.

There have been 1,146,564 infections and 18,851 coronavirus-related deaths here since the pandemic began, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).

Meanwhile, the daily test positivity rate fell to 31.05% from Thursday's 32.19%.

Amid growing concerns about the highly infectious Delta variant, Dhaka division reported the highest 60 deaths, Khulna and Chattogram 33 each, Rangpur 12, Barishal 10, Sylhet eight, Rajshahi seven, and Mymensingh three.

However, the death rate stood at 1.64% and the recovery rate rose to 85.35%