New Delhi (dpa) - India is now the nation second-worst hit by the Covid-19 pandemic, after its caseload surpassed that of Brazil's on Monday. That leaves only the United States with more cases, and India's virus curve showing no signs of flattening.

Some 90,802 cases in the past 24 hours pushed India's total to 4.2 million, topping that of Brazil, which has more than 4.1 million cases, data on the Health Ministry and Johns Hopkins University websites showed on Monday. The US has more than 6.2 million cases.

Approximately 1,016 people also died in India during that period, taking the country's total death toll to 71,642, the third-highest national toll, the data showed.

More than 77 per cent of patients had recovered.

India has been recording the world's highest daily increases in cases for almost a month, with many new infections being reported from rural areas where health care systems are poor. Hospitals and test centres in several regions are overburdened.

Even as it has emerged as the new Covid-19 epicentre globally, India’s economy - once the world’s fastest growing major economy – is in a shambles due to the impact of the pandemic.

Infections have grown exponentially since India began to lift lockdown restrictions in May to revive an economy that shrunk almost 24 per cent in the latest quarter, the biggest contraction among major economies. Millions of people have lost jobs.

Although India is now conducting more than 1 million tests daily, the test rate per 1,000 people are still lower than several countries, since it is the world's second-most populous country.

Serological tests, which look at antibodies, have shown that the real number of cases in Indian cities are many times the confirmed number, meaning many more Indians have been exposed to the virus.

On Monday, metro services in cities including New Delhi and Bengaluru resumed operations after five months of closure due to strict safety and social-distancing measures. Bars are also set to reopen in Delhi and other cities later this week.

The worst-affected areas have been the western state of Maharashtra and the southern states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. India’s populous Uttar Pradesh state has also seen a spurt of Covid-19 cases. These five states contribute 60 per cent of India’s virus cases.

There has been a resurgence in cases in the Indian capital as well, with more than 3,200 infections recorded on Sunday, the city’s highest level in two months.

India’s “comprehensive and calibrated actions within the umbrella strategy of ‘test, track, treat’ have resulted in a low mortality rate, the federal Health Ministry said.

“Sustained efforts through early diagnosis, and timely and effective treatment continue to steadily push the CFR (case fatality rate) down,” the ministry said on Twitter. The fatality rate stood at 1.7 per cent on Monday morning.

Globally, coronavirus infections have topped 27 million, while 883,000 people have died. After the US, India and Brazil, Russia, Peru and Colombia have the highest number of virus cases globally.

European hotspots have also seen a surge, with infections in Britain increasing by the most in more than three months, according to news reports.