New Delhi, Sep 30 (UNI) India, faced with a daunting task of halting the Novel Coronavirus from penetrating further into the country, reported 80,472 fresh infections of COVID-19 during the past 24 hours, pushing the country's caseload beyond 62 lakh on Wednesday, while the death toll climbed to 97,497, with 1,179 fresh casualties.

According to the Union Health Ministry data, a total of 86,428 people recovered in the same period, surging the recoveries to 51,87,825.

The current recovery rate stands at 83.33 per cent. The gap between the recovered cases and the active cases has crossed 42 lakh (42,47,384). With increasing number of recoveries, the gap is continuously widening.

The active cases have less than halved in two months, from 33.32 per cent on August 1 to 15.11 per cent on September 30, according to the ministry.

There are 9,40,441 active cases of Coronavirus infection in the country, which comprises 15.11 per cent of the total cases, while the fatality rate stands at 1.57 per cent.

Of the new cases, Maharashtra contributed the maximum with nearly 15,000 cases, followed by Karnataka with more than 10,000 cases.

Seventy-six per cent of the new cases are from 10 States and UTs. The fresh cases break up is: Maharashtra - 14,976, Karnataka - 10,453, Kerala - 7,354, Andhra Pradesh - 6,190, Tamilnadu - 5,546, Uttar Pradesh - 3,981, Assam - 3,592, Delhi - 3,227, West Bengal - 3,188 and Odisha - 3,067.

Nearly 85 per cent of freshly reported deaths are concentrated in ten State/UTs of Maharashtra - 430, Karnataka - 136, Punjab - 75, Tamil Nadu - 70, Uttar Pradesh - 63, West Bengal - 62, Delhi - 48, Chhattisgarh - 39, Madhya Pradesh - 39 and Andhra Pradesh - 35.According to government, 14 States & UTs have less than 5,000 active cases.

Following the "Test, Track, Trace, Treat, Technology strategy", states and UTs are registering speedy recoveries and 14 states and UTs have less than 5,000 active cases.

As plasma therapy is proving to be effective determent in combating Corona, Jammu and Kashmir's GMC hospital has finally started conducting antibody testing on fully recovered patients and aims to set up plasma bank to treat COVID-19 positives with this therapy.

As recovery rate is spiralling, Nashik recorded 65k cured corona patients with recovery rate at 87.94 pc.It further said the highest 91.92 per cent recovery rate is in the city areas followed by Malegaon (83.04), Nashik Rural (79.04) and district non-natives (71.87).

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