Coronavirus update: India overtakes Russia to become third worst-hit country in the world

India recorded the third highest number of coronavirus cases in the world after the United States and Brazil, according to the data released by John Hopkins University. The United States was the worst-hit by coronavirus pandemic. The deadly novel virus infected 2,852,807 people in the US. The death toll related to COVID-19 infection stood at 129,718 in the country. The COVID-19 tally in Brazil zoomed to 1,577,004.

India added a record number of coronavirus cases on Sunday. According morning data released by the health ministry, the country registered nearly 25,000 fresh coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours. This was the biggest daily spike since the outbreak started.

The country was under the nationwide lockdown since the last week of March to curb the virus spread. Several relaxations were made in the last three months to restart the economic activities. However, school, colleges, gyms, swimming pools were shut to avoid the spread. The international flights and metro rail have been suspended since in the last week of March.

Maharashtra, the worst-hit state by COVID-19 pandemic, reported over 2.06 lakh cases. At least 6,555 new coronavirus cases were detected in the last 24 hours. The state reported 151 deaths today, taking the fatalities in the death toll to 8,822.

Tamil Nadu became the second state in India to confirm over 1 lakh COVID-19 cases. With 4,150 fresh COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, Tamil Nadu's total number of confirmed coronavirus patients surged to 1,11,151, according to the state health department.

Delhi's COVID-19 tally inched towards the grim milestone of 1 lakh today. At least 2,244 people tested positive for the novel coronavirus in the last 24 hours. With this, the total number of coronavirus cases in the capital stood at 99,444. Delhi will be the third state in the country to record more than one lakh COVID-19 cases after Maharashtra and Chennai.

Two COVID-19 vaccine candidates — Covaxin, developed by the Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech International Limited in collaboration with the ICMR and the National Institute of Virology (NIV) and ZyCov-D vaccine by Zydus Cadila — had recently got the nod for human clinical trials from the Drug Controller General of India. Both have been approved for Phase II, III trials.

Globally, over 1.1 crore people were tested positive for the novel coronavirus virus. More than 5.31 lakh COVID-19 patients lost their lives across the world.