India on Sunday crossed the 17 lakh mark as it recorded 54,735 fresh Coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours taking tally to 17, 50,723, data shared by the Ministry of Health said.

As many as 853 people succumbed to the deadly infection in the same period taking the death toll to 37,364.

Of the total infections, 5,67,730 are active cases while a whopping tally of 11,45,629 patients have been cured.

The recovery rate continues to improve and currently stands at 64.53 per cent. The positivity rate — percentage of patients who have tested positive for coronavirus — stood at 10.87 per cent this morning while the fatality rate remained at 2.15 per cent.

The total number of COVID-19 samples tested up to August 1 is 1,98,21,831 including 4,63,172 samples tested on Saturday.

India currently has a total of 1,344 laboratories which are functional and capable of carrying out COVID-19 testing, of which 913 are government while 431 are private.

Maharashtra remained the worst-hit state with total number of cases crossing 4,20,000, with 14,994 deaths out of which 265 occurred in the last 24 hours.

Tamil Nadu comes in second with 2,45,859 cases and 3,935 deaths. The state registered 97 fatalities in the last 24 hours.

Meanwhile, Telangana registered 10 new COVID-19 deaths and 1,891 confirmed cases during the last 24 hours.

The fresh fatalities pushed the death toll to 540, while the overall caseload rose to 66,677. The state on Saturday had recorded the highest-ever spike of 2,083 cases.

Meanwhile, Delhi, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh saw a decline in the number of active cases.

While Delhi reported 37 less cases in the last 24 hours, Haryana’s active case count went down by 180 and Himachal Pradesh’s by 14 cases.

Mizoram, Tripura and Uttarakhand too saw a decline in the number of active cases.

At the global front, India still remains the third worst-hit country in terms of cases.

As of Sunday morning, the total number of cases stood at 17.8 million and the fatalities rose to 6,84,111,  according to the Johns Hopkins University.

The US with 46,20,419 positive cases and  1,54,361 fatalities and Brazil with 27,07,877 infections and 93,563 deaths remain the two worst affected nations.

While, there were 47,472 deaths reported due to COVID-19 in Mexico.

Patna: A health worker collects swab samples for coronavirus testing at Patliputra Ashok Hotel isolation centre in Patna, on Aug 1, 2020.