india

Updated: Apr 29, 2020 18:19 IST

India’s doubling rate of Covid-19 positive cases is 11.3 days since the last three days, and the country’s mortality rate due to the highly infectious disease is around 3 per cent, Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan said on Wednesday.

Although the global mortality rate of coronavirus patients is around 7 per cent, India’s mortality rate of 3 per cent extends hope for all those afflicted by the disease.

About 86 per cent of those Covid-19 patients who have succumbed to the deadly disease so far also had co-morbid conditions like acute diabetes and hypertension, the minister, who is a doctor himself, said.

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“Only 0.33 per cent Covid-19 patients are on ventilators, 1.5 per cent patients are on oxygen support and 2.34 per cent patients are in the ICU, which reflects the quality of care being provided across the country,” Dr. Harsh Vardhan told the media.

At least 288 government laboratories are working along with 97 private lab chains with around 16,000 sample collection centres which are testing around 60,000 samples per day, according to health ministry data.

“The government is working hard to increase the testing capacity to 1 lakh tests per day within the next few days,” the health minister said.

With 1813 new Covid-19 cases and 71 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, the total number of coronavirus positive cases in India has risen to 31,787, which includes 22,982 active cases and 7,797 who have been cured and discharged, health ministry data indicated.

At least 1008 coronavirus patients have succumbed to the contagious disease so far. .