New Delhi: With 48,661 people testing positive for coronavirus infection in a day, India’s COVID-19 tally climbed to 13,85,522 on Sunday, while the recoveries mounted to 8,85,576, according to the Union health ministry data.
The country’s death toll rose to 32,063 with 705 fatalities being recorded in a day, the data updated at 8 am showed.
There are 4,67,882 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country.
As many as 36,145 patients have recuperated from coronavirus in a span of 24 hours, the highest recorded in a day, pushing the recovery rate to 63.92 per cent, the ministry said on Sunday. The number of recoveries exceed active coronavirus infections by 4,17,694.
The total number of confirmed cases also includes foreigners. This is the fourth consecutive day when COVID-19 cases have increased by more than 45,000.
The total number of tests for detection of COVID-19 has crossed the 16 million-mark in the country.
According to the ICMR, a cumulative total of 1,62,91,331 samples have been tested up to July 25 with 4,42,263 samples being tested on Saturday.
Of the 705 deaths reported, 257 were from Maharashtra, 89 from Tamil Nadu, 72 from Karnataka, 52 from Andhra Pradesh, 42 from West Bengal, 39 from Uttar Pradesh, 29 from Delhi, 22 from Gujarat, 14 from Bihar, 12 from Jharkhand, 11 from Rajasthan and 10 from Odisha.
Centre decides against including Itolizumab in clinical management protocols
The National Task Force on COVID-19 has decided against including Itolizumab drug in clinical management protocols for treating the disease even though the DCGI has approved its “restricted emergency use” in infected patients, official sources said.
Considering the unmet medical needs in COVID-19, Itolizumab, an already approved drug of Biocon, used for treating psoriasis — a skin condition — was approved for “restricted emergency use” in the treatment of coronavirus by the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) recently.
The permission to market the drug was granted for the treatment of cytokine release syndrome in ‘moderate’ to ‘severe’ Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome patients due to COVID-19.
“The issue of including the drug in the clinical protocols was discussed in a meeting held on Friday. A majority of the members of the task force opined that there was not enough evidence currently to get the drug included in the clinical management protocols for COVID-19,” said an official source.
A domestic biopharmaceutical company, Biocon, has been manufacturing and marketing Itolizumab, a monoclonal antibody, for the treatment of patients with moderate to severe chronic plaque psoriasis since 2013, under the brand name ALZUMAb, the Union health ministry had earlier said.
However, a Biocon spokesperson said, “The National Covid Task Force needs to see more evidence and we will provide them large real-world data to enable the committee to reconsider its decision on inclusion of Itolizumab in the protocol.”
“Nearly 1,000 patients have used the drug across the country with good outcome data,” the company spokesperson said. (PTI)
