India registers highest single-day spike with 86,432 new Covid-19 cases

India reported yet another record single-day spike of 86,432 coronavirus cases that made it the third country whose total tally went past the four million mark.

The total number of cases now stand at 40,23,179, according to health ministry data today.

India is behind Brazil, the world's second worst affected country after the United States with a total caseload of 40,91,801.

India witnessed 1,089 Covid-19 related deaths in the last 24 hours, taking the total death count to 69,561, the data showed.

About 31 lakh patients have recovered from the infection in India, pushing the recovery rate to 77.2 percent.

Fifteen districts across five states of Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh have been reporting higher active Covid-19 caseloads, fatality rates and a surge in cases for the past four weeks, the health ministry said.

As cases continue to surge, India's apex medical body Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has recommended that all people living in containment zones, areas with a large number of Covid-19 cases, should be tested using Rapid Antigen Testing (RAT) kits.

In its latest advisory, ICMR also recommended "testing on demand" for "all individuals undertaking travel to other countries or Indian states, mandating a negative Covid-19 test at the point of entry".

The states, however, can use their discretion to modify the approach, according to the fresh advisory.

"If an individual develops symptoms following a negative RAT (Rapid antigen tests) , an RT-PCR test should be done," reads ICMR's new guidelines.