India reports nearly 47,000 more coronavirus cases

By Cheena Kapoor

NEW DELHI, India (AA) - India’s coronavirus count on Sunday neared the 8.2 million mark after it registered 46,964 new cases over the past day, official figures revealed.

The country recorded its lowest daily death toll in four months with 470 new deaths reported in the last 24 hours, bringing the toll to 122,111.

Government data revealed that India was recording an average of 1,000 deaths a day in August. In September, this number rose to 1,100 a day when the number of fresh cases peaked at an average of 90,000 cases a day.

Close to 7.5 million patients have recovered from the disease in the country, 58,684 in the last 24 hours, pushing the recovery rate to 91.54%.

The total number of active cases in the country now stands at 570,458. As per the Health Ministry on Friday, for the first time in 85 days, the active caseload went below 600,000.

The country has been reporting a decline in the number of cases but experts have warned of a spike during the festival season which runs till mid-Nov.

October saw the first monthly fall in COVID-19 infections since the outbreak of coronavirus in the country in March with both fresh cases and deaths declining by nearly 30% from the previous month’s figures.

Despite a downward trend in the number of cases, a surge in cases has been reported in the western state of Maharashtra, the southern state of Kerala, and the Indian capital, Delhi. For a fourth consecutive day, Delhi recorded over 5,000 cases, 5,062 on Saturday.

India is the world's second-worst affected country after the United States, which has over 9 million infections.