The number of recovered COVID-19 patients has crossed one million in Maharashtra. 23,644 patients recovered on Saturday, taking the total count to 10,16,450 so far. Meanwhile, the state also witnessed a 15 per cent rise in its daily cases. 20,419 new cases and 430 fatalities were reported, taking the total count to 13,21,176 with 35,191 deaths.
Of the 430 fatalities, 227 are from the last 48 hours and 110 are from last week. The remaining 93 deaths are from the period before it. Of the total deaths, 129 were in Pune, followed by 110 in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), 62 in Kolhapur, 36 in Nashik, 29 in Nagpur, 22 in Latur, 21 in Aurangabad and 16 in Akola, while five deaths were from other states.
Mumbai also witnessed a slight surge in cases on Saturday. 2,283 new cases and 44 deaths were reported, taking the city’s total case count to 1,96,459 with 8,747 fatalities so far. Meanwhile, the city’s recovery rate has also increased to 81 per cent.
The Konkan region, which comprises Raigad, Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg districts, has witnessed a surge in cases and fatalities in the past month. Senior health department officials said the movement of people from the state’s hotspots to the Konkan region during Ganeshotsav in August was the primary reason for the increase in cases. “We had anticipated a rise in cases after Ganeshotsav. So far, the hike is not so much that the district would have difficulties in managing its patients. The district administration has been told to carry out rigorous contact tracing. As the region has poor connectivity, if the spike goes out of hand, it would lead to an increase in deaths,” said an official.
So far, a total of 63.76 lakh tests have been conducted in the state, of which nearly 20.69 per cent were positive. There are 19.45 lakh people in home quarantine and over 30, 571 people in institutional quarantine.
