Coronavirus Daily Update: COVID-19 cases explained in charts

India reported around 45,882 cases in the last 24 hours, officials said on November 20, the 13th consecutive day that the country reported less than 50,000 new coronavirus infections.

Chaitanya Mallapur

November 20, 2020 / 10:41 IST

As many as 45,882 new cases of novel coronavirus were reported in the last 24 hours, pushing India’s COVID-19 tally to above 90 lakh, the health ministry’s November 20 update said.

The country reported 584 deaths and 44,807 recoveries, the release shows. Active cases rose to 4,43,794, with a rise of 491 cases in a day.

Delhi reported the most (7,546) new cases in the last 24 hours followed by Kerala (5,722), Maharashtra (5,535), West Bengal (3,620) and Rajasthan (2,549). These five states now account for nearly half (54 percent) of all the new cases in India.

covid-19-update_Nov20

Of the 584 new deaths, Maharashtra reported the most 154 deaths followed by Delhi (131), West Bengal (53) and Uttar Pradesh (39). Chhattisgarh, Karnataka and Kerala reported 26 deaths each. These seven states account for 72 percent of all the new deaths reported across the country.

COVID-19 Vaccine

Frequently Asked Questions

How does a vaccine work?

A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine.

How many types of vaccines are there?

There are broadly four types of vaccine — one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine.

What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind?

Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time.

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