India records fresh high of over 410,000 new COVID-19 cases

NEW DELHI, May 7 (Xinhua) -- India's COVID-19 tally reached 21,491,598 on Friday as a fresh high of 414,188 new cases were registered in the past 24 hours, said the federal health ministry.

It was the third time this month when over 400,000 cases have been registered in a single day.

Besides, 3,915 more COVID-19-related deaths were recorded in the country since Thursday morning, taking the total death toll to 234,083, according to the health ministry.

There are still 3,645,164 active cases in the country, with an increase of 78,766 through Thursday. A total of 17,612,351 people have been cured and discharged from hospitals so far.

The COVID-19 figures continue to peak in the country, but the federal government has ruled out imposing a complete lockdown. Some states have imposed night curfews or partial lockdowns, while the capital Delhi has been put under a third successive lockdown till May 10.

So far, over 164 million vaccination doses have been administered in India since the country started the nationwide inoculation drive in January. The third phase of vaccination for people aged above 18 began on May 1.

Meanwhile, 298,601,699 COVID-19 tests have been conducted across the country till Thursday, out of which 1,826,490 tests were conducted on Thursday alone, according to the latest data issued by the Indian Council of Medical Research on Friday.

On Wednesday Principal Scientific Advisor to India's Federal Government K. Vijay Raghavan said a third wave of COVID-19 outbreak is inevitable in India given the higher levels of the circulating virus, though "it is not clear on what time scale this phase three will occur."