BENGALURU (BLOOMBERG, REUTERS) - India's Covid-19 death toll grew to the fourth largest globally as the disease's spread continues to accelerate through the world's second most populous country.
India added 942 deaths from the novel coronavirus in the past 24 hours, topping the UK with a total of 47,033 fatalities.
Now India is only behind the US, Brazil and Mexico in the overall number of deaths.
The country reported another record daily rise in Covid-19 infections on Thursday (Aug 13) with 66,999 cases from a day earlier to reach a total of nearly 2.4 million to date, its health ministry said.
It has now the world's biggest case load behind the United States and Brazil.
The mounting number of lives lost in India comes as the country's outbreak has become one of the fastest growing in the world.
India has been reporting about 50,000 or more new infections a day for 15 straight days, higher than both the US and Brazil, the two biggest outbreaks in absolute terms.
The epicentre of the disease is shifting from India's globally connected cities like Mumbai and New Delhi to the country's vast hinterland, where most of the population lives and medical infrastructure is considerably weaker.
Despite the rising number of deaths, the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has touted the country's fatality rate, which at 2 per cent of cases is one of the world's lowest, as a sign of success.
However, India's history of compiling incomplete death statistics at the best of times, and the difficulty of testing more than a small fraction of its 1.3 billion people, have led to speculation that deaths are being undercounted.
The rising numbers also reflect a broader shift as the pandemic - which has sickened more than 20 million people and killed almost 750,000 - moves from wealthier parts of the globe to developing nations whose health-care systems are quickly overwhelmed.
The greatest number of infections and fatalities from the pandemic are now found in developing countries such as Mexico and Brazil, as they surpass former hotspots like the UK and France.
Among the 10 countries with the highest number of cases, the US is the only one from the developed world, topping the list with more than 5 million infections.
