Reuters :
India’s coronavirus infections surged to more than a three-month high on Friday, led by a record daily increase in Maharashtra, where authorities have adopted fresh curbs to restrain the spread of the disease.
India’s overall tally of infections stands at 11.51 million, the highest after the United States and Brazil. The country reported 39,726 new coronavirus cases on Friday, its highest since Nov. 30.
Deaths rose by 154 to 159,370, data from the health ministry showed.
Maharashtra, home to India’s commercial capital, Mumbai, reported record 25,833 cases, accounting for 65% of the country’s new infections in the past 24 hours. This marks the single highest daily case count in the state, topping the numbers of September 2020, when India was adding close to 100,000 cases a day.
The state health minister said they have requested 2 million vaccine doses per week from the federal government, with the aim of inoculating 300,000 people per day. “We are aggressively vaccinating people in the state,” Maharashtra’s health minister, Rajesh Tope, told reporters. Hospital beds and special COVID-19 facilities were filling up fast, especially in Mumbai, and other major industrial cities including Nagpur and Pune, officials said.
The capital, New Delhi, has also reported a steady rise in infections over the last two weeks, prompting city authorities to scale up the immunization campaign to 125,000 doses per day, compared with about 40,000 at present.
