No Under-reporting Of COVID-19 Deaths In India: Health Ministry

Amid a sky-rocketing number of coronavirus cases in the country, the Union Ministry of Health on Tuesday claimed there was no under-reporting of COVID-19 deaths in India.

The Ministry added, "States are doing causality assessment and attributing the cause of death accordingly."

India recorded 5,598 Covid-19 deaths till Tuesday as the number of positive cases inched towards 2 lakhs. 

"One in every two COVID-19 deaths in India has been of senior citizens who constitutes 10% of our total population," the Health Ministry said, adding that 73 per cent of COVID-19 deaths in India were of people with comorbidities.

Trying to paint a positive picture, Health Ministry spokesperson Lav Agarwal told reporters that India's fatality rate per lakh population is 0.41, which is amongst the lowest in the world.

Health Ministry also said that 14 countries with their cumulative population almost equal to that of India have reported 55.2 times more COVID-19 deaths. 

"Our preventive measures to curtail COVID-19 have been very effective; we are very far-away from the peak," said a spokesperson of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

"Instead of using the word 'community transmission', we need to understand the extent of COVID-19 spread," he added.

As many as 3,708 COVID-19 patients were cured in the last 24 hours, according to government data. Additionally, 95,527 patients have recovered in total taking recovery rate to 48.07 per cent.

(With PTI inputs)