Delhi health minister hospitalised with Covid-19 symptoms

Delhi Health Minister Satyander Jain tweeted today that he has been hospitalised with complaints of high fever and breathlessness and will undergo a test for coronavirus.

"Due to high grade fever and a sudden drop of my oxygen levels last night, I have been admitted to RGSSH (Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital). Will keep everyone updated," the 55-year-old minister wrote in a Twitter post this morning.

Jain yesterday attended an all-party meeting where Indian Home Minister Amit Shah and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal were present among others, reports our New Delhi correspondent.

Last week, Kejriwal too had fever but tested negative for Covid-19.

Delhi has been witnessing a sharp rise in Covid-19 cases and the tally climbed by over 10,000 and reached the 40,000 mark in just six days with an average of over 1,600 new cases daily.

The virus has infected over 41,000 in Delhi so far and claimed more than 1,300 lives.

Meanwhile, India reported a spike of 10,667 new Covid-19 cases and 380 fatalities in the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 3,43,091 cases and the death toll to 9,900, according to the Indian health ministry.

More than 10,000 new Covid-19 cases were recorded across India in the last 24 hours for the fifth successive day today.

Now, the number of active cases stands at 1,53,178, while 1,80,012 people have recovered, according to the officially updated figure this morning. "Thus, around 52.46 per cent patients have recovered so far," our correspondent reports quoting a health ministry official as saying.

Of the 380 new deaths, the western state Maharashtra accounted for the highest 178 fatalities followed by Delhi at 73, Tamil Nadu at 44, Gujarat 28, Haryana 12, West Bengal 10, Rajasthan 9 and Madhya Pradesh 6.

The coronavirus situation in Delhi remained grave with over 42,000 cases, making the national capital the state with the third highest number of infections in India after Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.