Second virus surge grips India on first anniversary of lockdown

India’s richest state, Maharashtra, reported 30,535 new coronavirus infections in the past 24 hours, which could send the country’s overall cases to a multi-month high when national data is released later on Monday.

A year ago, India had observed what Prime Minister Narendra Modi called a people’s curfew, marking the start of a chaotic nationwide lockdown in a bid to contain the virus. With 11.6 million cases, India is now the worst-affected country after the United States and Brazil.

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Maharashtra, India’s most industrialised state and home to its financial capital Mumbai, has been accounting for more than 60% of the country’s total cases after a full-scale reopening of its economy unleashed a second wave of infections late last month.

The state recorded 99 COVID-19 deaths in the past 24 hours, a case fatality rate of 2.15%, which is higher than the national figure of around 1.5%.

Reuters