New Delhi: Delhi recorded 444 fresh COVID-19 cases on Friday, the seventh time the daily infection count stood below the 500-mark in January, while the positivity rate dipped to 0.59 per cent, officials said.
The infection tally in the city stood at 6.29 lakh and the death toll mounted to 10,654, they said.
The active cases tally on Friday dropped to 3,779 from 4,168 on Thursday.
The city had recorded 654 cases on Wednesday with a positivity rate of 0.88 per cent, the only time the daily infection count has crossed the 500-mark in the first seven days of January.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain had earlier said the positivity rate had been below one per cent for the past several days, indicating improvement in the pandemic situation here.
From December 21-23, the daily case count had been below the 1000-mark. On December 21, 803 cases were reported; 939 on December 22 and 871 cases on December 23.
However, on December 24, 1,063 cases were recorded, dropping again to 758 on December 25 and 655 on December 26. On December 27, 757 cases were recorded while on December 28, the daily cases count was 564, the lowest in the last five months.
On December 29 and 30, the city recorded 703 and 677 cases, respectively. On December 31, 574 cases were recorded.
This month, 585 cases were reported on January 1, 494 on January 2, 424 cases on January 3, 384 on January 4, 442 cases on January 5 and 486 on Thursday.
These 444 new cases resulted from the 75,724 tests conducted the previous day, including 38,839 RT-PCR tests and 36,885 rapid antigen tests, according to the latest bulletin issued by the Delhi health department.
The bulletin said the total number of cases has climbed to 6,29,282.
Meanwhile, a second dry run for the COVID-19 vaccination roll-out in Delhi is being conducted across several districts of the national Capital on Friday, officials said.
The districts include South Delhi, South East Delhi, North West Delhi and New Delhi, they added.
The officials said 10 vaccination centres have been chosen in South Delhi for the dry run, including the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), the Safdarjung Hospital, the Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya Hospital, the Pushpwati Singhania Hospital and Research Institute.
The first dry run for the COVID-19 vaccination roll-out was held in Delhi on January 2 at three sites — the GTB Hospital, Shahdara, the Urban Primary Health Centre, Daryaganj and the Venkateshwar Hospital, Dwarka.
City Health Minister Satyendar Jain had earlier said the COVID-19 vaccine will be provided to the people of Delhi for free once it arrives and asserted that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government had made all preparations for the vaccination drive.