Mumbai, (Asian independent) Maharashtra on Saturday notched single-day high of 3,874 coronavirus cases — up from peak 3,827 a day earlier — even as state capital Mumbai recorded its new high of 136 deaths in a day out of total 160 fatalities in the state.
The state’s death toll shot up from 142 a day earlier to 160 — down by 18 from the previous peak of 178 recorded on June 15, health officials said here.
With this, the state’s death toll climbed to 5,984 and total corona cases shot up to 128,205, with a recovery rate of 50.04 per cent, the highest in the country.
For most days in June, the state has recorded three-digit deaths and 3K plus in new patients daily.
This comes to roughly one death every 9 minutes, and a whopping 161 new cases notched every hour in the state, with a mortality (death) rate of 4.67 per cent, causing big worries.
The Health Department said a positive sign was that 58,054 ‘active cases’ were lower than patients cured. As many as 1,380 patients were cured and sent back home on Saturday, taking the total such cases to 64,153 — higher than the 58,054 ‘active cases’.
The city’s death toll is now up from Friday’s 3,425 to 3,561, while the positive cases have gone up by 1,190 to 65,329 now.
Ten more deaths were reported in Nashik, 6 in Aurangabad, 5 in Pune, and one each in Beed, Jalna and Solapur.
There was a surprise from Dharavi – Asia’s biggest slum – which recorded only 7 new cases, taking the total cases to 2,158. The fatalities total 79.
The MMR (Thane division) remains an issue of concern with 4,413 Covid-19 deaths, and positive cases totalling 94,165.
Thane – with 23,212 cases and 675 fatalities – has emerged as the second worst-hit district after Mumbai in the state, but did not record any fatality for the second consecutive day.
Pune district has dropped to the third position with 15,286 patients and 615 deaths till now. Yet, Pune division ranks second (after MMR) with 18,287 patients and 834 deaths.
However, the Pune district on Saturday recorded lower death toll of 587 compared with 610 on June 19, with Pune division’s fatalities 797 compared with 829 on Friday.
There has been similar inexplicable drop in death toll figures for other divisions, but officials were not available for comments on the matter.
Meanwhile, the number of people sent in home-quarantine increased to 594,719 from from 591,049 on Friday, while those in institutional quarantine decreased from 25,697 to 25,099.