5 States account for India's 62% active coronavirus cases: Health Ministry

New Delhi, Sep 03: The Centre on Thursday said five states Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra account for 62% of the total active coronavirus cases in the country.

Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra account for 70% of total Covid-19 deaths in the country," said Rajesh Bhushan, Secretary, Union Health Ministry.

Bhushan also added that five states, mainly Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra accounted for 62% of total active cases in the country.

India's COVID-19 tally raced past the 38-lakh mark on Thursday with the sharpest single-day spike of 83,883 fresh cases, while the number of recoveries surged to 29,70,492, pushing the recovery rate to over 77 per cent, Union health ministry data showed.

The total number of coronavirus cases in the country mounted to 38,53,406, while the death toll climbed to 67,376 as 1,043 people succumbed to the disease in a span of 24 hours, the data updated at 8 am showed.

The national COVID-19 recovery rate has risen to 77.09 per cent and the case fatality rate due to the infection has further declined to 1.75 per cent.

There are 8,15,538 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country which comprise 21.16 per cent of the total caseload, the data stated.

India's COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7 and went past 30 lakh on August 23.

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research, a cumulative total of 4,55,09,380 samples have been tested up to September 2 with 11,72,179 samples being tested on Wednesday -- the highest in a day so far.