In India, 4,205 people died from coronavirus in one day, the highest number ever in a 24-hour period. Overall, the number of CoV deaths exceeded 250,000, the Indian Ministry of Health announced today.
348,421 new infections were counted, bringing the total to more than 23 million infections now officially confirmed in the Asian country. Yesterday, 3,876 deaths and 329,942 new infections had been reported.
India is currently the country most affected by the pandemic. In absolute numbers, India, with its more than 1.3 billion inhabitants, is the country most affected by the pandemic after the USA. However, the number of unreported cases is likely to be significantly higher: In parts of the vast country, it is difficult to get tested, and especially in rural areas, many victims die at home and do not always show up in the statistics.
B.1,617 already detected in 44 countries
Coronavirus variant B.1.617, discovered in India, has already spread to more than 44 countries, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The mutant, which first appeared in October, has been detected in more than 4,500 samples in a database “from 44 countries in all six WHO regions,” the UN agency said today. In addition, there were reports of detections from five other countries, it said.
Outside India, the most cases of infection with the viral variant were found in the United Kingdom. WHO had on Monday classified B.1.617 as “of concern” because the variant may be more contagious and also less sensitive to antibodies.
The virus that triggered the global CoV pandemic has already undergone thousands of mutations, some more worrisome than others. India first reported the appearance of genome B.1.617 to the Global Initiative for Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID) sequence database in October 2020.
- source: orf.at/picture: pixabay.com
This post has already been read 859 times!