The recovery rate of COVID-19 cases in India has been considerably improving while the fatality rate in the country is among the lowest in the world, the Union ministry of health and family welfare claimed on Tuesday.
A total of 60,490 COVID-19 patients have recovered in the country so far, the ministry said.
“The recovery rate continues to improve and presently it is 41.61 per cent. The fatality rate is 2.87 per cent which is among the lowest in the world,” said Lav Agarwal, joint secretary at the health ministry, at his daily press briefing.
"While every death reported is painful, the fatality rate has been observed overall around the world at 6.4 percent, therefore, India has one of the lowest fatality rates amongst the countries with a high number of cases," he said.
Agarwal further claimed that the COVID-19 cases in India were being reported at a much lower rate than the world average. Across the world, 69.9 cases per lakh population have been reported while in India, the number is 10.7 cases per lakh population, he said.
He asserted that lockdown, social distancing and other guidelines had helped India fare better than many other countries in handling the pandemic.
In a separate statement, the health ministry said India has rapidly increased its testing capacity and is on track to meet the emerging requirements.
“India is now testing an approximate 1.1 lakh samples per day. Capacity has been increased by augmenting number of labs, shifts, RT-PCR machines and manpower. As of today, India has 612 total labs, 430 run by ICMR and 182 in the private sector to test the population for COVID-19 infection,” it said.
Guidelines have been issued to States/UTs advising immediate testing for symptomatic and home quarantine for asymptomatic migrant workers, the statement further said.
