India's daily COVID-19 cases dip sharply to 34,113, deaths drop to 346 in last 24 hours

New Delhi, February 14, 2022

India's daily COVID-19 cases dipped sharply on Monday to 34,113 in the last 24 hours and the number of deaths fell to 346 as the spread of the coronavirus pandemic continued to decelerate across the country.

The 346 deaths registered today incuded 77 previously unreported fatalities in Kerala, where the data of the past many months is being reconciled and updated in an exercise that has been going on for several weeks now as per the broadened definition of COVID-19 deaths under new guidelines.

The country had yesterday reported 44,877 new cases of COVID-19 infection and 684 deaths, including 282 previously undeclared fatalities in Kerala.

Kerala has, through reconciliation of data, added more than 24,400 deaths to its toll in the last several weeks. The death toll in the state due to the pandemic now stands at 62,199.

If the 77 previously unreported deaths in Kerala are not counted, the number of people who died of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours in India is 269, significantly lower than the 402 posted yesterday.

With the latest data released by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare (MoHFW) this morning, the death toll in the country from COVID-19 so far has climbed to 509,011 today.

The total number of cases of infection till now, since the first cases of COVID-19 were reported in India in late January 2020, rose to 42,665,534 today.

Not counting the 77 previously unreported fatalities in Kerala, the 269 deaths reported in India in the last 24 hours included 69 deaths in Kerala, 27 each in Karnataka and West Bengal, 22 in Odisha, 17 in Maharashtra, 13 in Gujarat, 12 in Delhi, and 11 each in Punjab and Tamil Nadu.

Other States reported less than ten deaths each, with 10 States and Union Territories posting zero deaths during this period.

The number of those who have recovered from COVID-19 in the country increased to 41,677,641 today, up 91,930 from yesterday. The recovery rate improved further to 97.68% today from 97.55% yesterday.

The number of active cases of COVID-19 in the country fell for the 20th consecutive day today, going down 58,163 to below 500,000 at 478,882.

Meanwhile, the number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country has crossed 172.95 crore today, including 11.66 lakh doses given in the last 24 hours.

The Daily Positivity Rate rose slightly to 3.19% today while the Weekly Positivity Rate fell to 3.99%.

A total of 75.18 crore COVID-19 tests have been conducted so far in the country, including 10.67 lakh tests done in the last 24 hours.

NNN