100-crore COVID-19 Vaccination Milestone LIVE Updates (Representational Image.)

India recorded 8,488 new coronavirus infections, the lowest in 538 days, taking the country’s total tally of COVID-19 cases to 3,45,18,901, while the active cases declined to 1,18,443, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Monday.

The death toll climbed to 4,65,911 with 249 fresh fatalities, according to the data updated at 8 am. The daily rise in new coronavirus infections has been below 20,000 for 45 straight days and less than 50,000 daily new cases have been reported for 148 consecutive days now.

The active cases comprise 0.34 per cent of the total infections, the lowest since March 2020, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.31 per cent, the highest since March 2020, the ministry said.

A decrease of 4,271 cases has been recorded in the active COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours.

The daily positivity rate was recorded at 1.08 per cent. It has been less than two per cent for last 49 days. The weekly positivity rate was recorded at 0.93 per cent. It has been below two per cent for the last 59 days, according to the ministry.

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 | Daily COVID-19 cases in country lowest in 538 days

Coronavirus Update | The death toll climbed to 4,65,911 with 249 fresh fatalities, according to the data updated at 8 am. The daily rise in new coronavirus infections has been below 20,000 for 45 straight days and less than 50,000 daily new cases have been reported for 148 consecutive days now.

100-crore COVID-19 Vaccination Milestone LIVE Updates (Representational Image.)

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