In what came as a big relief to the health authorities during the Diwali weekend, the Covid-19 deaths and infections plummeted in Maharashtra on Sunday, as the State recorded nearly six months’ low of 60 deaths and 2,544 infected cases.
A far cry from the peak death tally of 515 witnessed on September 15, the daily fatalities came down to 60 on Sunday, taking the Covid-19 toll in the state from 45,914 to 45,974.
Similarly, as against a single-day peak infection tally of 24,886 witnessed on September 11, the daily infected cases dropped to 2,544. With the fresh infected cases, the total infections in the state went up from 17,44,698 to 17,47,242.
As 3065 more people were discharged from various hospitals the number of people discharged from the hospitals after full recovery since the second week of March this year went up to 16,15,379. The recovery rate in the state rose marginally from 92.41 percent to 92,45 percent.
Of the 60 deaths reported on Sunday, Mumbai accounted for a maximum of 15 deaths, followed by 9 deaths in Thane, 7 each in Nashik and Pune, 4 each in Parbhani and Chandrapur, 3 in Beed, 2 each in Ahmednagar, Sangli and Nagpur and one death each in Raigad, Solapur, Satara, Sindhudurg and Gondia.
With 15 deaths, the Covid-19 toll in Mumbai climbed from 10,558 to 10,573, while the infected cases rose by a relatively low 577 cases to trigger a jump in the total infections in the metropolis from 269,133 to 269,710.
Meanwhile, the number of “active cases” in the state came down one lakh mark as the total cases rose from 84,082 on Friday to 84,918 on Sunday. The fatality rate in the state stood at 2.63 per cent.
Pune district, which continued to be the worst-affected city-district in Maharashtra, saw the total number of cases increase from 3,41,056 on Friday to 3,41,877 on Sunday, while the total number of deaths in Pune increased from 7131 on Friday to 7156 on Sunday.
Thane district remained in the third spot --after Pune and Mumbai – after the total number of infections rose from 2,30,262 on Friday to 2,31,239 on Sunday, while the pandemic toll climbed from 5361 on Friday to 5389 on Sunday.