India reports record 75,000 new virus infections

India has recorded another single-day record of new coronavirus cases, reporting 75,760 new confirmed infections in the past 24 hours.

The Health Ministry on Thursday also reported 1,023 deaths in the past 24 hours, taking total fatalities up to 60,472.

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India’s previous highest daily count was 70,488 on Aug. 22. India has been recording more than 60,000 new infections per day for the last two weeks and now has reported 3.3 million cases since the pandemic began.

With an average of more than 800,000 tests every day, India has scaled up testing per million to more than 27,000, the ministry said.

Delhi has about 11,000 active cases after more than 139,000 people were infected.

India has reported the third most cases in the world after the United States and Brazil, and its reported fatalities are the fourth-highest in the world.

Australia’s virus hotspot Victoria state has recorded its third deadliest day of the pandemic as well as the lowest tally of new COVID-19 infections in more than eight weeks.

The 23 dead reported Thursday followed 24 deaths on Wednesday. The all-time daily record of 25 deaths was set on Aug. 17.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison  speaks to the media. File photo

Victoria’s Health Department said 22 of the most recent deaths were related to aged care.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said outcomes in four Melbourne aged care homes were "unacceptable.”

But while 56% of British aged care homes had staff or residents infected with COVID-19, the proportion was only 8% in Australia, he said. Only four out of 700 aged care facilities in Victoria had been "acutely effected,” he said.

"My fear when the COVID pandemic hit in Victoria was that we could have potentially seen far more,” Morrison said.

The 113 new cases reported on Thursday was the lowest count since 87 on July 5.

The UN children’s agency says at least a third of the world’s children couldn’t access remote learning when the pandemic closed schools, creating "a global education emergency.”

UNICEF said in a report released Wednesday night that nearly 1.5 billion children were affected by school closures at the height of nationwide and local lockdowns.

"For at least 463 million children whose schools closed due to COVID-19, there was no such a thing as remote learning,” UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said.

"The sheer number of children whose education was completely disrupted for months on end is a global education emergency,” she said in a statement. "The repercussions could be felt in economies and societies for decades to come.”

Associated Press