Nearly 12,000 deaths in 97 days: How India’s toll soared across states

India’s death toll from the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) has exceeded the 10,000-mark after nearly 100 days since the first fatality was recorded in the country in March.

The country added 2,004 deaths, including the 1,672 backlogged fatalities, and 10,951 infections in its Covid-19 tally on Tuesday, taking the toll to 11,919 from 353,853 infections.

The country’s case fatality rate, which is defined as the proportion of death to the total number of cases, rose from 2.9% to 3.4%.

The Union health ministry, which updates its data every morning, is yet to reflect the backlogged deaths.

The death toll in India surged beyond the 10,000-mark after Delhi and Maharashtra took into account hundreds of fatalities that were pending review. Their toll went by 437 and 1,409 respectively.

Maharashtra recorded 81 cases through the day to take its total death count to 5,537. The state has had 113,445 Covid-19 cases and the new death numbers take its CFR to 4.9% from 3.7 a day earlier.

The national capital also recorded the highest number of deaths – 93 – in a 24-hour period. Delhi now has recorded 44,688 infections in all and 1,837 of the patients have succumbed to the disease.

Tuesday’s reconciling of numbers takes CFR in the city from 3.3% to 4.1% in a single day.

A senior official from Delhi’s health department said the jump in numbers was due to the death committee’s efforts over the last four days to go through all previous emails and add the deaths.

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