Mumbai, Oct 8 (IANS): Maharashtra's Covid-19 deaths and cases continued to remain in the higher range on Thursday even as Mumbai notched its second highest new infections, health officials said here.

The state witnessed another 358 fatalities - lower than the peak of 515, and the state toll zoomed from 39,072 to touch 39,430 now.

The state recorded another 13,395 new infections - lesser than the peak single-day tally of 24,886 - taking up the state total from 14,80,489 to 14,93,884 cases till date.

In some relief, the state recovery rate also went up for the fourth day - from 80.81 per cent to 81.13 per cent - while the current mortality (death) rate remained stable at 2.64 per cent for the fifth day.

Against this, 15,575 fully recovered patients returned home taking up the total number of discharged patients shot above 12-lakhs, from 11,96,441 to 12,12,016 till date - much higher than the 241,986 'active cases' (ill) currently in the state.

As per Thursday's figures, there was one death roughly every 4.02 minutes and 558 new cases added every hour to the state tally.

Of the 358 deaths, Pune again jumped to the top with 61 fatalities, 57 in Thane, 48 in Mumbai, 31 in Nagpur, 21 in Satara, 20 in Wardha, 15 in Ahmednagar and 10 in Sangli - in the higher bracket.

There were 9 fatalities in Beed, 7 each in Nashik, Kolhapur, Ratnagiri, Parbhani, Osmanabad and Bhandara, 6 each in Aurangabad and Nanded, 5 in Palghar, 4 in Raigad, 3 each in Jalgaon and Latur, 2 each in Solapur, Jalna, Washim and Gondia, 1 each in Dhule, Nandurbar, Sindhudurg, Hingoli, Amravati and Chandrapur, besides 3 from other states or foreigners - in the lower bracket.

Remaining in the sub-50 range for the seventh day this month, Mumbai recorded 48 fatalities, and the city toll shot up from 9,248 to 9,296 while the number of cases shot up by the second highest 2,823 (compared to highest 2,848 cases on October 7), and the city total zoomed from 219,961 to 222,784 now.

Of the total 8 Circles, Mumbai circle (MMR - comprising Mumbai, Thane, Palghar and Raigad) remains on the edge as deaths spiral and cases pile up.

The MMR fatalities shot up by 114 - taking up the toll from 16,559 to 16,673 and with another spike of 4,932 new infectees, the total cases zoomed up from 511,524 the previous day to 516,456 now.

With another 84 fatalities, the Pune circle's (comprising Pune, Solapur and Satara districts) death toll zoomed from 8,476 to 8,560 and the daily infections increased by 2,806 - from 388,022 a day earlier to 390,828 cases now.

Meanwhile, the number of people sent to home quarantine increased - from 22,48,741 to 22,84,204 now - while the number of those in institutional quarantine went down from 25,655 to 25,321 on Thursday.