India on Saturday recorded a sharp rise in the number of Coronavirus cases with 149 patients testing positive for the highly contagious disease — the highest single-day jump — taking the tally over 850 with the death toll at 19, according to the Union Health Ministry.

In its updated figures, the ministry stated two fresh deaths.

However, it could not be immediately known where these two new deaths were reported from as the state-wise figures are awaited.

So far, deaths have been reported from Maharashtra (4) Gujarat (3), Karnataka (2 ) and one each from Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, Punjab, Delhi, West Bengal, Jamnu and Kasmir and Himachal Pradesh.

Four days into the 21-day “total lockdown” across India –announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday to contain the COVID-19 outbreak — thousands of migrant labourers are walking long distances back to their home villages after all transport was stopped except for essential services. On Friday, the central government asked the states to take steps and prevent the mass exodus.

Meanwhile, the Reserve Bank Governor Shaktikanta Das on Friday announced several measures to mitigate the negative impact of coronavirus on the economy.

Earlier on Thursday, Finance Minister Nirmala Sithraman declared a Rs 1.75-lakh-crore scheme – dubbed as the “Prime Minister Gareeb Kalyan scheme” – to help the economically weaker sections survive the loss of jobs and income that would be the inevitable fallout of the coronavirus outbreak.

India has maintained that there is no evidence of community transmission of coronavirus happening at the moment, however, preparations to tackle such a situation have already begun.

On Friday, in a press briefing, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said that his administration is equipped to handle 100 Covid-19 cases in a day. He said that the Delhi government is now working on the plan to tackle stage 3 of COVID-19 outbreak.

The global death toll has reached 27,360. while the confirmed cases of Coronavirus has reached 6,00,000.

Europe is the worst-hit continent with 17,314 fatalities. Italy had the highest numbers of deaths in the world at 8,165, followed by Spain (4,858) and China (3,292).

Italy recorded a shocking spike in coronavirus deaths Friday with 969 new victims, the worst daily record for any country since the pandemic began.

The US now has more COVID-19 cases than any other country after more than 16,000 COVID-19 infections were reported in a single day, mostly in the New York City. The number of people infected with the novel Coronavirus in the United States hit more than 104,000 early on Saturday, according to a Johns Hopkins University tally, with the number of fatalities surpassing 1,700.

China has reported 54 new imported Coronavirus cases, taking their tally in the last few days to 649, while the death toll in the country has risen to 3,295 with three more fatalities confirmed on Friday, China’s National Health Commission said on Saturday. While no new locally transmitted cases of Covid-19 were reported on Friday, the number of Coronavirus infections in people returning from abroad has gone up to 649 with 54 new cases reported, it said.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Friday disclosed he has tested positive for Coronavirus but will continue to discharge his duties from self-isolation.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization warned Friday that a dire lack of protective gear for health workers battling the COVID-19 pandemic is one of the most pressing threats in the fight to prevent deaths, . “The chronic global shortage of personal protective equipment is now one of the most urgent threats to our collective ability to save lives,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual news conference in Geneva.

The International Monetary Fund chief has said the global economy has entered recession and it will be much worse than the financial crisis of 2009.