Covid-19 Update: 7,495 New Infections Registered Today, Omicron Cases Touch 236

Covid-19 Tally In India Today: There have been 6,960 recoveries and 434 deaths in the last 24 hours.

(File Photo/ Getty Images)

New Delhi: India reported 7,495 fresh Covid-19 cases on Thursday as the total number of Omicron variant cases touched 236. With this, the country's tally reached 3,47,65,976. India's active caseload currently stands at 78,190, the lowest in 573 days.

There have been 6,960 recoveries, and 434 deaths in the last 24 hours. Total recoveries stand at 3,42,08,926 and death toll touched 4,78,759, according to the news agency ANI.

The active cases in the country account for less than one per cent of total cases, currently at 0.24 per cent which is the lowest since March last year, according to the ministry of health and family welfare. The total vaccination coverage stands at 1,39,69,76,774.

With 65 cases, Maharashtra has reported the maximum cases of the new strain. Maharasthra is followed by Delhi (64), Telangana (24), Rajasthan (21), Karnataka (19), Kerala (15) and Gujarat (14).

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold a review meeting today on the Covid-19 situation in the country, reported news agency ANI. The meeting comes amid the spike in Omicron-led increase in infections across the country.

The union health ministry has issued an advisory to the states to stay alerted and prepare for a probable Omicron spread. The suggested measures include the imposition of night curfews, activating war rooms, creating containment zones, and reserving beds for Omicron patients.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization chief warned on Wednesday that the rush in wealthy countries to roll out additional Covid vaccine doses was deepening the inequity in access to jabs that is prolonging the pandemic, according to AFP report.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus insisted that the priority must remain to get vaccines to vulnerable people everywhere rather than giving additional doses to the already vaccinated. "No country can boost its way out of the pandemic," he told reporters.

The UN health agency has long decried the glaring inequity in access to Covid vaccines. Allowing Covid to spread unabated in some places dramatically increases the chance of new, more dangerous variants emerging, it argues.