COVID-19: Delhi records August’s highest single-day spike with nearly 1,700 cases; death toll 4,347

Delhi recorded 1,693 fresh coronavirus cases on Wednesday, the city's highest single-day spike this month so far, taking the tally to over 1.65 lakh, while the death toll climbed to 4,347, authorities said. As many as 17 deaths were reported on Tuesday too when the daily cases rose by 1,544, which was the highest single-day spike in August till that date.

Delhi recorded 1,693 fresh coronavirus cases on Wednesday, the city's highest single-day spike this month so far, taking the tally to over 1.65 lakh, while the death toll climbed to 4,347, authorities said. This is also the highest single-day spike in the national capital in the last 45 days. As many as 1,781 fresh cases were reported on July 11.

Seventeen fatalities have been recorded in the last 24 hours, according to the latest bulletin issued by the Delhi health department. As many as 17 deaths were reported on Tuesday too when the daily cases rose by 1,544, which was the highest single-day spike in August till that date. The active case tally on Wednesday rose to 12,520 from 11,998 the previous day. On June 23, the national capital had reported the highest single-day spike of 3947, till date. The death toll from COVID-19 in Delhi stood at 4330 on Tuesday.

The Wednesday bulletin said, the death toll from coronavirus infection has risen to 4,347 and the total number of cases climbed to 1,65,764. Also, on Wednesday, the number of containment zones jumped to 716 from 654 the previous day, according to the bulletin.

Fresh cases and active cases have shown an increasing trend over the last several days, with Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday saying COVID-19 tests in Delhi will be doubled to 40,000 per day within a week as there has been a marginal increase in the number of coronavirus cases in the city. The number of active cases of COVID-19 in the national capital has shown a steady increase this month since August 5, except on three days when it recorded a marginal fall compared to the figure a day before, according to official data.

Delhi has seen a fluctuation in the number of novel coronavirus cases since the beginning of this month. On August 1, the city recorded 1,118 fresh cases while for the next three days, the number of infections reported in a single-day stayed below the 1,000-mark.

From August 5 to August 9, the number of fresh COVID-19 cases again stayed above the 1,000-mark only to come down to 707 on August 10. Three days between August 11 and August 22, the city saw less than 1,000 fresh cases -- August 13 (956), August 16 (652), and August 17 (787). According to the bulletin, out of the total number of beds in COVID hospitals, 10,448 are vacant.

Also, 4,075 beds in COVID care centres are occupied by persons under quarantine, including travelers who have returned by Vande Bharat Mission and bubble flights, it said. According to the bulletin, 1,48,897patients have either recovered, been discharged or migrated so far.

The number of people in home isolation stands at 6,208. The number of Rapid Antigen Tests conducted on Wednesday stood at 13,904 while the RT-PCR, CBNAAT and True NAAT test figures were 5,912, in all adding to 19816, according to the bulletin.

The total number of tests done till date in Delhi stands at 14,82,661. The number of tests done per million, as on Wednesday was 78,034, it said.