India records 10,000 new Covid-19 cases in a day

Rising number of infections sees Serum Institute restart Covishield vaccine manufacture

A woman covers her face on a crowded street in Chennai, India, on Tuesday, amid a spike in Covid-19 cases. EPA

India has reported more than 10,000 new cases of Covid-19 in a day, prompting its Health Ministry to issue safety guidelines.

The 10,158 new infections in the last 24 hours took the total active cases to nearly 45,000, a more than threefold jump in the last week.

India has recorded more than 44 million cases and nearly 531,000 deaths since the start of the coronavirus pandemic in early 2020.

Southern Kerala recorded 1,613 new cases in the last 24 hours.

Western Maharashtra state recorded more than 1,100 new cases — its highest daily surge in the last seven months. Mumbai, India’s financial capital, reported 320 cases.

At least 15 deaths were recorded, according to the Health Ministry.

In a tweet on Thursday, India’s Health Ministry asked citizens to “follow Covid-appropriate behaviour to defeat” the infection. The country lifted all Covid-19 restrictions in March last year.

In northern Uttar Pradesh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath urged officials to make dedicated Covid hospitals functional and reactivate the Integrated Covid Control and Command Centre.

The state has nearly 1,800 positive cases.

Vaccine production restarted

Amid the rising number of infections, the Serum Institute of India — the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer — has restarted the manufacture of the Covishield vaccine.

The institute was the first vaccine manufacturer in the country to produce Oxford-AstraZeneca’s Covishield.

It stopped production of the vaccines in December 2021 due to adequate stock, a drop in demand and slow take-up of booster shots.

The institute's chief executive Adar Poonawalla told the Times of India that the company has six million booster doses of the Covovax vaccine available.

India witnessed one of the worst waves of the pandemic in April and May 2021, with millions of people contracting the Delta variant. At least 240,000 people are estimated to have died from Covid-19 during that period.

Medical staff perform a drill at a government hospital in Kolkata on Tuesday amid rising Covid-19 cases. EPA

Hospitals across the country ran out of space and lacked the staff, medication and equipment to deal with the number of cases. Desperate families searched for oxygen cylinders as hospitals grappled with a shortage of supplies.

Amid fears of a potential fourth wave, the Health Ministry has conducted a nationwide drill to step up emergency plans, and asked private and government-run hospitals to check the availability of oxygen beds, ventilators, PPE kits and other critical care equipment and services.