Maharashtra Fights Infection: COVID-19 cases cross 70k-mark

In a major development, Thane district with 9,941 cases has become the second worst-hit in the State, overtaking Pune district's tally of 8,045 cases.

Monday's toll includes a staggering 60 deaths in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region alone -- the worst-hit in the country. This comes to roughly one death every 19 minutes and an average 98 new cases notched every hour in the State.

Maharashtra has been recording 75-plus fatalities and over 2K new patients daily for the past one week, with the previous highest figures of 3,041 infections notched on May 24.

With 76 fatalities, the State's death toll has touched 2,362 while the total number of coronavirus patients increased from Sunday's 67,655 to 70,013 on Monday.

The Health Department said that of the total number of cases declared till date, 37,534 were ‘active cases', increasing by 1,503 over Sunday's 36,031.

The State recorded a recovery rate of 43 per cent while the mortality rate remained unchanged at 3.37 per cent. In the past three months, the State has built an impressive rate of recoveries from March 31 (12.91 per cent) to April 30 (16.88 per cent) to May 31 (43.35 per cent).

Of the total 76 fatalities on Monday, 40 were recorded in Mumbai alone, taking the city's death toll up from Sunday's 1,279 to 1,319 now while the number of confirmed cases here shot up by 1,413 cases to touch 41,099.