India accounts for 38% of global Covid-19 cases, highest share reached by any nation

India, which has been recording over 3 lakh covid cases every day since the last four days, now accounts for 38% of worldwide infections — the highest share reached by an country at any stage of the pandemic. A month ago, this number stood at 9%, data from the John Hopkins University showed.

On Tuesday, the country recorded 3,23,144 fresh cases and 2,771 related deaths as the second wave of the novel coronavirus continued to wreak havoc. India’s cumulative case count stands at 1,76,36,307 while its death toll has climbed up to 1,97,894.

Experts, however, believe that this number is far from the reality as testing is very limited in the rural areas.

Positivity rate has also been surging. A good indicator of the proportion of infections being captured by the official data is the share of tests that come back positive. The World Health Organisation considers an epidemic to be under control if that proportion is below 5%. In America, it currently stands at about 7%; in Britain it is 0.2%, while in India, as a whole, it is 25%.

Vaccination in the country has also not picked up pace with only 10% of the 140 crore-odd population having been inoculated.