75% of 86,508 COVID-19 cases in 24 hours concentrated in 10 states/UTs: Health ministry

Seventy-five per cent of the 86,508 COVID-19 cases reported in a span of 24 hours in the country are concentrated in 10 states and Union territories, including Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Delhi and Chhattisgarh, the health ministry said on Thursday.

Seventy-five percent of the 86,508 COVID-19 cases reported in a span of 24 hours in the country are concentrated in 10 states and Union territories, including Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Delhi, and Chhattisgarh, the health ministry said on Thursday. Maharashtra continues to top this list. It has alone contributed to more than 21,000 cases, followed by Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka with more than 7,000 and 6,000 coronavirus cases, respectively.

The ten states and UTs are Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Delhi, Kerala, West Bengal, and Chhattisgarh, the ministry said. "Also, 1,129 fatalities due to coronavirus have been registered in a day with 10 states/UTs --Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Delhi and Haryana accounting for 83 percent of such deaths," it said.

Maharashtra reported 479 deaths followed by Uttar Pradesh and Punjab with 87 and 64 deaths, respectively, the ministry said. There are 9,66,382 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country which comprises 16.86 percent of the total caseload, the ministry data stated.

India has substantially ramped up its testing infrastructure across the country. As on date, there are 1,810 laboratories, including 1,082 government and 728 private labs. A cumulative total of 6,74,36,031 samples have been tested for the detection of COVID-19 till September 23 with 11,56,569 samples being tested on Wednesday.

India's COVID-19 caseload mounted to 57,32,518 with 86,508 people testing positive in a day, while the death toll climbed to 91,149 with 1,129 people succumbing to the disease in a span of 24 hours, the data updated at 8 am on Thursday showed.