Indian Union Home Minister Amit Shah tests COVID-19 positive

India logged more than 17 lakh cases of coronavirus on August 2 thus adding 1 lakh patients to the tally in just two days. Now, the Union home minister of the country, Amit Shah has tweeted that he has tested positive for the coronavirus.

“My health is fine but I am being admitted to the hospital on the advice of doctors. I request all of you who have come in contact with me in the last few days to please isolate yourself and get your inquiry done,” Amit Shah said in his tweet.

With nearly 55,000 new cases (54,736), the number of confirmed infections in India crossed the 17-lakh mark on Sunday. The country recorded a jump of over 1.5 lakh cases in the past three days.

The spike came as the country rolled Unlock 3 — the third phase of the lifting of restrictions — was rolled out last week. The government of India, however, is yet to open places that see a large gathering of people, including schools and colleges, cinema halls, gymnasiums, swimming pools, bars, and assembly halls. Many states announced lockdown in different degrees last month as numbers spiked.

The pandemic has claimed the life of a minister from Uttar Pradesh. Kamal Rani Varun, 62, died at Lucknow’s Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences yesterday.

The World Health Organisation (WHO), has meanwhile, said that the said it expects the Covid-19 pandemic to be of “lengthy duration” and that it remains “a public health emergency of international concern.”

“The pandemic is a once-in-a-century health crisis, the effects of which will be felt for decades to come,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was quoted as telling panel.

It took just 185 days for India to cross the 17-lakh mark after the first case was reported in Kerala in January this year. The country had crossed the one lakh-mark in 110 days. More than 60 percent of total cases in the country and over 50 percent of total deaths have been recorded in July.

Globally, there are nearly 18 million infections, while over 6.84 lakh people have succumbed to COVID-19.