India recorded a single-day rise of 70,421 new COVID-19 cases, the lowest in 74 days, taking the country's infection tally to 2,95,10,410, while the count of active cases fell below 10 lakh after over two months, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Monday.

The COVID-19 death toll in the country climbed to 3,74,305 with 3,921 fatalities recorded in a span of 24 hours, the data updated at 8 am showed.

The count of active cases has further declined to 9,73,158 which is 3.30 percent of the total infections, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has improved to 95.43 percent.

A net decline of 53,001 cases has been recorded in the COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours, the data showed.

Also, 14,92,152 COVID-19 tests were conducted on Sunday, taking the total number of such examinations in the country so far to 37,96,24,626, it stated, adding that the daily positivity rate was recorded 4.72 percent.

COVID-19 Vaccine

Frequently Asked Questions

How does a vaccine work?

A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine.

How many types of vaccines are there?

There are broadly four types of vaccine — one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine.

What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind?

Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time.

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Coronavirus update: India records 70,421 COVID-19 cases, lowest in 74 days; 3,921 deaths registered

The COVID-19 death toll in the country climbed to 3,74,305 with 3,921 fatalities recorded in a span of 24 hours, the data updated at 8 am showed.

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