COVID-19 toll at 603, cases climb to 18,985 in India

The death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 603 and the number of cases climbed to 18,985 in the country on Tuesday, registering an increase of 44 deaths and 1,329 cases since Monday evening, according to the Union health ministry.

The number of active COVID-19 cases stood at 15,122 while 3,259 people have been cured and discharged, and one patient has migrated, the ministry said.

Thus, over 17 per cent of the cases have recovered so far, a health ministry official said.

The total number of cases includes 77 foreign nationals.

A total of 44 deaths were reported since Monday evening -- 11 fatalities were reported from Rajasthan, 10 from Gujarat, nine from Maharashtra, three from Uttar Pradesh and two each from Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Tamil Nadu and Telangana and Madhya Pradesh. One death has been reported from Karnataka.

Of the 603 deaths, Maharashtra tops the tally with 232 fatalities, followed by Gujarat at 77, Madhya Pradesh at 76, Delhi at 47, Rajasthan at 25, Telangana at 23 and Andhra Pradesh at 22.

The death toll reached 20 in Uttar Pradesh while Karnataka and Tamil Nadu have reported 17 cases each.

Punjab has registered 16 deaths while West Bengal has reported 12 fatalities due to coronavirus infection so far.

The disease has claimed five lives in Jammu and Kashmir, while Kerala and Haryana have recorded three COVID-19 deaths each.

Jharkhand and Bihar have reported two deaths each, while Meghalaya, Himachal Pradesh, Odisha and Assam have reported one fatality each, according to the ministry data.

However, a tally of figures reported by various states and union territories, as on 6.50 pm Tuesday, showed 605 deaths.

There has been a lag in the Union Health Ministry figures, compared to the number of deaths announced by different states, which officials attribute to procedural delays in assigning the cases to individual states.

According to the health ministry's data updated in the evening, the highest number of confirmed cases in the country are from Maharashtra at 4,669 followed by Delhi at 2,081, Gujarat at 2,066, Rajasthan at 1,576, Madhya Pradesh 1,540 and Tamil Nadu at 1,520.

The number of COVID-19 cases has gone up to 1,294 in Uttar Pradesh, 919 in Telangana and 757 in Andhra Pradesh.

The number of cases has risen to 415 in Karnataka, 408 in Kerala, 392 in West Bengal, 368 in Jammu and Kashmir, 254 in Haryana and 245 in Punjab.

Bihar has reported 114 coronavirus cases, while Odisha has 74 such cases.

Forty-six people have been infected with the virus in Uttarakhand and Jharkhand each.

Himachal Pradesh has 39 cases, Chhattisgarh has 36 while Assam has registered 35 infections so far.

Chandigarh has 26 COVID-19 cases, Ladakh 18, while 16 cases have been reported from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

Meghalaya has reported 11 cases, while Goa and Puducherry have seven COVID-19 patients each.

Manipur and Tripura have two cases each, while Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh have reported a case each.

"Our figures are being reconciled with the ICMR," the ministry said on its website.