Over 141.9 million vaccine doses administered so far, Indian govt says

Daily new infections of coronavirus (Covid-19) in India have been witnessing a rapid rise since the second wave of the pandemic. On Monday, 352,991 new cases and 2,812 new deaths were reported. It was for the fifth straight day that India recorded more than 300,000 cases in a 24-hours' span. So far, 17,313,163 cases and 195,123 deaths have been reported in India.

Active caseload in the country constituted 16.25% of the total positive cases so far and stood at 2,813,658, according to data from the Union health and family welfare ministry. As many as 1,402,367 samples were tested in the previous 24 hours for the disease while a cumulative of 279,321,177 samples have been tested so far in the country, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). Meanwhile, 219,272 patients were discharged in the last 24 hours with which the overall recoveries rose to 14,304,382.

More than 141 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccine (141,911,223 to be exact) have been administered as of 8am on the day. The Covid-19 vaccination drive is also set to enter its next phase from May 1 to include all people above the age of 18 years.

Meanwhile globally, the United Kingdom, with 1,712 new cases and 11 deaths, reported its lowest daily new cases on Sunday since September 2020, news agency ANI reported. So far, the UK has seen 4,404,882 cases of the disease and 127,428 deaths. The country has also given at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to half of its population as on Saturday, according to news agency Bloomberg. The United States had administered 228,661,408 doses of the Covid-19 vaccine as on Sunday and distributed 290,692,005 doses, news agency Reuters cited data from the US Centres for Disease Control.