Maharashtra reports 20,740 Covid-19 cases, 424 deaths; 31,671 recover

Maharashtra recorded 20,740 new

coronavirus positive cases on Friday, taking the state's infection tally to 56,92,920, while 424 fatalities pushed the overall death toll to 93,198, the health department said.

On Thursday, the state had added 21,273 cases and reported 425 deaths.

These figures reflect a steady drop in the number of new infection cases in the state over the past few days.

As compared to the March-April period, when the state's caseload grew by one lakh every two days on an average, it took five days to add similar number of cases to its tally this week.

The state's COVID-19 tally had reached 56,02,019 on May 24, which went up to 56,92,920 on Friday.

The Maharashtra government's lockdown-like restrictions came into force on April 14, which will be in place till June 1. But these curbs have been extended by another 15 days, as per the announcement made by a minister on Friday.

Of the 424 deaths, 291 had occurred in the last 48 hours and 133 last week, the department said.

The number of recoveries outnumbered the count of new cases on Friday.

As many as 30,671 patients were discharged from hospitals during the day, taking the recovery count to 53,07,874. With this, Maharashtra's active case count stood at 2,89,088, it said.

The state's COVID-19 recovery rate improved to 93.24 per cent, while the case fatality rate is 1.64 per cent now, the department said.

The positivity rate is 16.57 per cent.

As many as 2,64,076 people were tested for coronavirus in the last 24 hours, taking the number of samples examined so far in the state to 3,43,50,186, it said.

Mumbai witnessed 924 new COVID-19 cases and 30 deaths, taking its infection tally to 7,02,522 and death toll to 14,750, the department said.

In Mumbai division, which includes Mumbai city and its satellite towns, 3,033 more people tested positive for the infection, while 51 patients died. With this, the caseload in Mumbai division rose to 15,24,377 and the death toll to 27,458, it said.

Nashik division reported 2,312 fresh cases, including 1,118 in Ahmednagar district. Of 46 deaths in the division, 21 were reported in rural parts of Ahmednagar district and 10 in rural parts of Nashik.

Pune division recorded 5,789 new cases, including 1,406 in Pune district and 2,398 in Satara district. Of the 106 deaths in the division, 40 were from rural parts of Solapur, followed by 26 and 24 from rural parts of Pune and Satara districts respectively, the department said.

Kolhapur division registered 4,120 fresh cases, including 1,446 in Kolhapur district. Out of the 96 deaths in the division, 36 were from rural parts of Kolhapur, 32 from villages in Sangli and 14 from Ratnagiri.

Aurangabad division recorded 783 coronavirus cases and the Latur division 1,280. It reported 54 deaths, of which 17 were from Beed, while 16 from Osmanabad.

Akola division witnessed 2,422 fresh infections.

Nagpur division reported 1,001 fresh cases of coronavirus, while 17 patients succumbed to the infection, of whom 10 were from Nagpur city.

Maharashtra's COVID-19 figures are as follows: Positive cases 56,92,920; new cases 20,740; death toll 93,198; recoveries 53,07,874; active cases 2,89,088; tests so far 3,43,50,186.