India Records Largest Daily Increase in Virus Cases

Date: 19 April 2020 - 20:46

News ID: ۷۷۶۰۲

MUMBAI (Dispatches) -- India recorded its largest daily increase in Covid-19 cases on Sunday night, adding 1,400 new infections to its tally of more than 16,000 amid a nationwide lockdown that’s about to enter its fourth week.
The South Asian nation’s cases have been surging over the last week as it gradually scales up its testing capacity. Confirmed infections were up 78% to 16,365 on Sunday, from 9,200 on April 12, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
Infectious diseases experts say the true number of infections is likely much higher given that the Indian Council of Medical research said the country has tested just 372,123 samples from its 1.3 billion citizens. That’s about 0.03%.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week extended the lockdown until May 3, but announced that makers of information technology hardware, farmers and industries in rural areas would be allowed to resume operations from Monday to start to revive stalled economic activity.
India has not yet taken a decision on when to lift or ease restrictions on domestic and international flights and urged airlines to take travel bookings only after a final decision is made, a government minister said.
The government announced a halt to domestic flights on March 23, ordering commercial airlines to shut down domestic operations on top of an existing ban on international flights to try and contain the spread of the coronavirus.
"The Ministry of Civil Aviation clarifies that so far no decision has been taken to open domestic or international operations,” civil aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri said in a tweet late on Saturday.
"Airlines are advised to open their bookings only after a decision in this regard has been taken by the Government”, he added.
About 144 million people travelled on domestic flights last year.