Coronavirus LIVE: India records 254,395 new cases; death toll nears 300,000

Coronavirus live updates: India witnessed 254,395 fresh coronavirus cases on Saturday, taking its tally to 26,285,069, Wordometer showed this morning. The death count rose to 295,508 after 4,143 more patients died in the last 24 hours. Vaccinations showed a downward graph amid fears of a third wave in the next 6-8 months. Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Dr Harsh Vardhan, reviewed public health response to Covid-19 and the progress of vaccination with nine States and UTs. “Recovery outnumbers new active cases for the last 8 days consistently," the minister said.

With 36,184 cases reported in the past 24 hours, Tamil Nadu is leading the state list. It is followed by Karnataka with 32,218 new infections. Maharashtra reported 29,644 cases, Kerala 29,673 and Andhra Pradesh 20,937 cases. The case count was 19,006 for West Bengal

The six most affected states by total cases are Maharashtra (5,527,092), Karnataka (2,367,742), Kerala (2,293,632), Tamil Nadu (1,770,988), Uttar Pradesh (1,659,265), and Andhra Pradesh (1,542,079).

World coronavirus update: Coronavirus cases rise unabated across the globe with 166,451,351 infected by the deadly contagion. While 147,253,554 have recovered, 3,456,917 have died so far. The US remains the worst-hit country with 33,802,324, followed by India, Brazil, France and Turkey. However, in the past seven days, India has added the highest number of fresh cases at 1,984,554, followed by the Brazil (461,731) and Argentina (204,941).