India records 261,500 new COVID-19 cases, 1,501 deaths in 24 hours

India recorded 261,500 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, the Union Health Ministry’s data released on Sunday showed. A total of 1,501 deaths were recorded in the past 24 hours across the nation, taking the death toll from coronavirus in India to 177,150. India’s tally of COVID-19 cases has now reached 14,788,109. 

In the last 24 hours, 138,423 people recovered from the COVID-19 disease. The tally of recovered COVID-19 cases has now reached 122,622,590. There are currently 1,801,316 active cases of coronavirus in India. 

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A total of 266,538,416 samples have been tested up till April 17, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) said. This includes 1,566,394 samples tested on Saturday. 

Since the vaccination drive against COVID-19 was kicked off in India on January 16, 122,622,590 people have been received at least a single dose.

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Two vaccines — Covaxin and Covishield, are being administered in India. The former is the indigenous jab developed at Hyderabad’s Bharat biotech. Covishield is AstraZeneca/Oxford’s jab that is being manufactured at the Pune-based Serum Institute.