India on Thursday recorded the world's highest single-day spike in Covid-19 cases, with over three lakh fresh infections in the past 24 hours.
According to the Indian Health Ministry, as many as 3,15,660 cases and 2,091 deaths were registered in the country in 24 hours as of April 21 midnight.
To date, no country in the world has reported such a high number of active Covid cases in a single day. Prior to India, only the US logged a little over 3 lakh cases in a single day, on January 2, 2021.
With the new infections and deaths, India's total caseload has now reached 1,59,24,914 while the fatalities from the infection have mounted to 1,84,662.
Maharashtra in western India is the country's worst-hit state, with 67,468 fresh infections in a single day -- thus accounting for nearly 22% of the new cases.
Maharashtra, where a strict lockdown has been enforced to contain the spread of Covid, is followed by Uttar Pradesh in northern India, with 33,214 new cases, and Delhi with 24,638 fresh infections.
The country is, in fact, witnessing a ferocious second wave of Covid and has been reporting over 2 lakh new cases daily since April 15.
On Wednesday, the High Court in Delhi lashed out at the federal government for for the shortage of oxygen at hospitals in the national capital. "We don't care... beg, borrow, steal or requisition new plants if you want," the court told the government.
The court also took cognizance of the deaths of as many as 24 Covid-19 patients due to disruption in oxygen supply at a government hospital in Maharashtra.
Those who lost their lives at Zakir Hussain Municipal Hospital in the state's Nashik district were on life support.
In fact, oxygen supply to the Covid ward at the hospital ran out following leakage of the life-supporting gas from a tanker that was brought to replenish the cylinders at the medical facility.
UNB had earlier reported about the oxygen crisis in India, particularly in the national capital.