Coronavirus: India's count surges past 1.3 lakh, records highest daily spike

The nationwide lockdown imposed as a precautionary measure to contain the spread of COVID-19 has been extended till May 31.

New Delhi: For the second day in succession, India has registered its biggest ever spike in the number of coronavirus cases, with 6,767 people testing positive for COVID-19 in the last 24 hours.

The number of deaths in the last 24 hours has also increased by 10 as 147 people lost their lives to the deadly infection, taking the total fatalities in India to 3,867, the ministry of health and family welfare said.

The total number of cases in the country has now mounted to 1,31,868, including 73,560 active cases, 54,440 cured/discharged and 3867 deaths, the ministry said. India's recovery rate stands at around 41.28% so far.

The tiny Himalayan state of Sikkim, which had so far managed to remain free from coronavirus, reported its first such case as a 25-year-old student who recently returned from Delhi tested positive for the virus.

Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-affected state with 47,190 COVID-19 cases. It is followed by Tamil Nadu (15,512), Gujarat (13,664), and Delhi (12,910).

India is the 11th most affected country right now, but its tally of active cases exceeds those of some top-ten countries including Spain, Italy, Germany, Turkey and Iran. Also, given its high daily average of past few days, India is fast approaching the overall tally of Iran, which is the tenth most affected in the world at present with nearly 1.33 lakh cases.

The overall number of global coronavirus cases has increased to over 5.3 million, while the death toll surged past 342,000, according to Johns Hopkins University. As of Sunday morning, the total number of cases stood at 5,309,698, while the death toll increased to 342,078, the University's Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed in its latest update.

The US has the world's highest number of cases and deaths at 1,622,605 and 97,087, respectively.