India reports 41,195 new COVID-19 cases in 24 hours

The country in the same period achieved the highest ever recovery rate, which is 97.45%, with 39,069 coronavirus patients recovering in 24 hours between Wednesday and Thursday mornings.

So far in the country, which was devastated by the second COVID-19 wave, 3,12,60,050 coronavirus patients have recovered.

The Union Health Ministry in its bulletin stated 52.36 crore anti-COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the country of 1.3 billion people.

Meanwhile, the Drugs Controller General Of India (DCGI) has given its nod to a study on mixing Covishield and Covaxin, the two main vaccines used in India's COVID-19 vaccination programme.

A Subject Expert Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) had recommended such a study on Jul 29.

This study would be different from the one conducted by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

ICMR studied 18 people, 11 male, and seven female with a median age of 62 years, in Uttar Pradesh in India who received Covishield as the first dose followed by inadvertent administration of Covaxin, said the report.

The study revealed that vaccination with a combination of an adenovirus vector platform-based vaccine followed by an inactivated whole virus vaccine was not only safe but also triggered better immunogenicity, the top health body said.