Maha Covid-19 deaths zoom to 105, cases cross 55K

Maharashtra on Wednesday notched a new record of 105 Covid-19 deaths, up by 8 over yesterday’s previous high of 97 fatalities, with the number of cases shooting above 55K, health officials said here.

It includes a whopping 64 deaths in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region alone, besides 2,190 new cases recorded across the state today.

This comes to roughly one death every 14 minutes, and an average 91 new cases recorded every hour, in the state.

Maharashtra has been recording 90-plus fatalities and new patients over 2K daily for the past two days consecutively, with the last highest figure of infections being 3,041 cases on May 24.

With 105 fatalities, the state death toll has touched 1,897 and the total number of coronavirus patients increased from 54,758 yesterday to 56,948 today.

The health department said of the total number of cases declared till date, 37,125 were ‘active cases’ — swelling by 1,947 over yesterday’s 35,178.

Besides, the doubling rate has improved from last week’s 11.5 days to 14.7 days today with a 31.5 percent recovery rate.

Of the total 105 fatalities today, 32 were recorded in Mumbai alone, taking the city deaths up from yesterday’s 1,065 to 1,097 now, while the number of Covid-19 positive patients here shot up by 1,044 cases to touch 34,018 today.

Mumbai’s congested Dharavi slum continued to be a major red-hotspot with 18 new cases today, taking the total number of infectees to 1,639 and figure of deaths climbing to 61.

Of Mumbai’s 32 deaths, besides one from Gujarat, there were 23 fatalities in Thane (Thane City, Navi Mumbai), 10 in Jalgaon, 9 in Pune, 8 in Raigad, 6 in Akola, 4 in Aurangabad, 3 each in Nashik and Solapur, 2 in Satara, and one each in Nagpur, Nandurbar and Palghar.

They comprised 72 men and 33 women, and nearly 63 per cent of them suffered from other serious ailments such as diabetes, hypertension, heart problems and asthma.

On the positive side, 964 fully cured patients returned home today, taking the number of those discharged to 17,918.

Maharashtra Police recorded one more death of a policeman, taking the total toll to 21, besides the total infectees increased by 75 to touch 1,964, comprising 233 officers and 1,741 personnel.

The MMR continued to cause grave concerns with 1,290 Covid-19 deaths and positive cases shooting to 43,466.

Though trailing a distant second after Mumbai, Pune Division fatalities touched 350, besides 7,688 patients.

The next major area of concern is Nashik Division with 121 deaths and 1,765 positive cases, followed by Aurangabad Division with 58 fatalities and 1,572 cases, and finally Akola Division with 40 deaths and 857 cases.

There’s Latur Division with 8 deaths and 284 cases, Kolhapur Division with 7 deaths and 651 patients, and finally Nagpur Division with 10 deaths and 612 cases.

Meanwhile, the number of people sent to home-quarantine increased from 567,622 to 582,701 today — a high jump of 15,079 — and those in institutional quarantine went up from 35,200, to 37,761, a spurt of 2,561.

The state’s containment zones increased from 2,562 yesterday to 2,684 on Wednesday and 17,119 health teams have carried out a survey of a population of around 68 lakhs in the state.-IANS news/Quaid Najmi