Maharashtra has had a steep rise in the number of cases in few weeks. In the three weeks of this month, the state alone has added more than 3.24 lakh cases. (Express Photo) The daily count of Covid-19 cases in Maharashtra touched yet another high on Sunday, with the discovery of over 30,000 infections. Till just five days ago, total number of cases from the entire country was fewer than this number.
For the third consecutive day, Pune reported more than 5,000 cases, which continue to be the highest for any city in the country. Sunday’s tally of 5,421 was slightly lower than 5,591 recorded on Saturday. Pune is now quite close to its all-time peak of 5,939 cases, achieved on September 10 last year.
Mumbai, like Maharashtra, is already scaling new heights. On Sunday, the city reported 3,779 infections, a new record. Nagpur, Thane, Nashik, Aurangabad and Jalgaon are the other cities in the state powering the surge. Nagpur reported 3,665 cases, a shade lower than the all-time high of 3,731 it achieved a day earlier.
Maharashtra has had a steep rise in the number of cases in few weeks. In the three weeks of this month, the state alone has added more than 3.24 lakh cases. This is comparable to the number of cases detected in the entire country in February. No other state has ever reported more than 12,000 cases in a single day. In fact, just three states – Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka – have crossed the 10,000-mark, all during the previous surge between August and October last year.
With Sunday’s addition, the state has so far recorded close to 25 lakh confirmed infections. The number of active cases in the state has gone beyond two lakh now. The state also reported 99 deaths on Sunday, the highest in December 20 last year. So far 53,339 Covid-related deaths have been reported from the state. Another 1,296 deaths from the state have been classified as those caused by “other causes” where Covid infections were found to be incidental.