NEW DELHI — Continuing the downward trend, India's COVID-19 case fatality rate on Sunday dropped to 1.93 percent, which is one of the lowest globally, the Union health ministry said.

This is a result of coordinated efforts of the center and state and union territory governments, it said.

"The USA crossed 50,000 deaths in 23 days, Brazil in 95 days and Mexico in 141 days. India took 156 days to reach this national figure," the ministry underscored as the number of fatalities due to coronavirus infection in the country reached 49,980.

Implementation of testing aggressively, tracking comprehensively and treating efficiently through a plethora of measures have contributed to the existing high level of recoveries as well, it said.

The total number of recoveries in the country rose to 1.86 million on Sunday, according to official data.

Improved and effective clinical treatment in hospitals, supervised home isolation, use of non-invasive oxygen support, and improved services of the ambulances for ferrying patients for prompt and timely treatment have been the focus of the center and all state governments, the ministry said.

It said "tireless efforts" of Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHA) have ensured effective surveillance and tracking progress of the patients in supervised home isolation.

Clinical management skills of doctors treating COVID-19 patients have been upgraded by active technical guidance through teleconsultation sessions by domain knowledge experts from AIIMS, New Delhi.

"These measures have collectively ensured seamless and efficient patient management from home to hospital for critical and severe patients. This has ensured that India's case fatality rate (CFR) is maintained below the global average," the ministry said.

From 3.33 percent on June 18, the CFR has declined to 1.93 percent, while India's recovery rate among COVID-19 patients has reached nearly 72 percent.

A total of 53,322 patients recuperated and were discharged in a span of 24 hours.

"The steady rise in recoveries has ensured that the percentage caseload of the country is reducing," the ministry said highlighting there are 677,444 active cases of coronavirus infection which compose the actual caseload of the country and comprise 26.16 percent of the total cases as on date.

They are under active medical supervision, it said.

With efficient and aggressive testing, India is rapidly moving towards completing 3 crore COVID-19 tests, according to the ministry.

A total of 29.3 million samples had been tested for detection of COVID-19 till Aug. 15, with 746,608 samples being tested on Saturday alone, the ministry said.

This has been made possible by a rapidly growing national network of diagnostic labs which comprises 969 labs in the government sector and 500 private labs, adding up to 1,469, it said.

India's COVID-19 tally increased to 2.59 million with a single-day spike of 63,490 infections, while the death toll climbed to 49,980 with 944 people succumbing to the disease in a span of 24 hours, the official data updated at 8 a.m. IST showed. — Agencies