During the current week (January 11-17), a little more than 1,05,000 new coronavirus cases were detected, the lowest weekly count since June 15-21. The tally was a drop of close to 21,000 from the previous week’s count of nearly 1,26,043. In percentage terms, only once has the weekly tally shown a sharper drop than this — 17.3% in December 14-20.
The seven-day average of daily cases now stands at 15,020, down to just 16% of the peak in mid-September. Incidentally, the pandemic touched its peak in India on September 17, exactly four months ago.
The weekly death toll too dropped sharply by an identical 16.6%. There were 1,259 fatalities in the current week, as opposed to 1,509 in the previous one. The average daily toll is now under 200 for the first time since mid-May last year. As with the case count, the weekly number of fatalities has been falling for the past six weeks running.
On Sunday, India reported 13,970 fresh cases, a drop of over 1,000 from the previous day’s tally. The day’s death toll dropped to 145. This was the first time since May 22 that less than 150 deaths from Covid-19 were recorded in a day.
