January 4, 2023: The Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Wednesday said that the country recorded a total of 175 new cases of Coronavirus infection in the last 24 hours.

With the record of the last 24 hours of Covid-19 infection, India's Active caseload currently stands at 2,570 with active cases at the rate of 0.01 per cent.

According to the Health Ministry, the country has recorded a total of 187 recoveries from the infection in the last 24 hours which increased the total recoveries to 4,41,45,854. India's current recovery rate stands at 98.8 pc, it added.

It further said that the Daily positivity and Weekly positivity rate of the country has been recorded at 0.09 pc and 0.12 pc respectively.

"220.11 cr Total Vaccine doses (95.13 cr Second Dose and 22.41 cr Precaution Dose) have been administered so far under Nationwide Vaccination Drive and 48,292 doses were administered in the last 24 hours," the health ministry added.

As per the ministry, a total of 91.13 crores Covid tests have been conducted so far, of which 2,01,690 were conducted in the last 24 hours.

As there have been reports of a surge in Covid cases in some countries, the operational readiness of health facilities is being reviewed in all states and Union Territories in case of another wave.

A recent surge has been observed in Covid cases across the world, because of BF.7 variant which is believed to be the major factor behind the surge including in countries like China and the US.

Now mandatory pre-departure RT-PCR testing has been introduced for passengers arriving in India on all international flights from China, Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea, Thailand and Japan. The test has to be conducted within 72 hrs prior to undertaking the journey, said the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in a press release issued on January 2, 2023.

The ministry release issued by Lav Agarwal, additional secretary, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, said the ministry has decided to revise and update its existing guidelines for International arrivals in view of the rising COVID cases in the above-mentioned countries.

It said that the Ministry of Civil Aviation's Air Suvidha Portal has to be made operational for passengers in all international flights from these countries, with a provision to allow international travellers arriving in India to submit negative RT-PCR test reports as well as to submit self-declaration form on this portal.

The Ministry said that the agreement will be in practice with effect from 10 am on Sunday, January 1, 2023, and that the existing post-arrival random testing of two per cent of travellers (irrespective of the port of departure) shall continue. (ANI)