India logs 1.72 lakh new cases in last 24 hours, deaths surge by 1,008

India on Thursday reported 1,72,433 new Covid cases in the last 24 hours, as per the Union Healthy Ministry's latest update.

The daily spike recorded on Thursday was 6.8 per cent higher than that recorded on Wednesday. The overall caseload in India now stands at 4,18,03,318.

The positivity rate went up from 9.26 per cent to nearly 11%.

India has witnessed a surge in Covid cases in the last one month led by the new variant Omicron. The country's active caseload currently stands at 15,33,921.

The top five states which registered the maximum number of Covid-19 cases are Kerala with 52,199 cases, followed by Karnataka with 20,505 cases, Maharashtra with 18,067 cases, Tamil Nadu with 14,013 cases and Gujarat with 8,934 cases.

As many as 65.95 per cent of the new cases are reported from these five states, with Kerala alone responsible for 30.27 per cent of the new cases.

There were 1,008 Covid-related deaths in the last 24 hours. This included a backlog of 355 deaths in Kerala.

2,59,107 recoveries were recorded in the last 24 hours, taking total recoveries in India to 3,97,70,414.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Tuesday requested States and Union Territories to accelerate the second dose coverage amongst those in the age group of 15-18 years.

India's daily positivity rate is at 10.99%. Positivity rate is the number of people that test positive out of every 100 tests conducted. The weekly positivity rate has gone up to 12.98%.

India conducted 15,69,449 Covid tests in the last 24 hours.