Stocks of healthcare and pharma majors like Divi’s Laboratories, Apollo Hospital, and others were on a roll during Wednesday’s session as fear related to fresh wave of coronavirus cases returned.

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To review the Covid preparedness, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya chaired a meeting with top officials as fresh spurt in cases in countries like Japan, South Korea, Brazil, China, and the US.

In this regard, the health ministry has urged all states and union territories to ramp up the  genome sequencing of positive samples to keep track of newer Coronavirus variants.

Individually, Divis Laboratories shares gained the most, rising around 4.5 per cent to Rs 3,499.25 per share; followed by Apollo Hospital, which was up nearly 2.5 per cent to Rs 4,710.00 apiece on the NSE. Similarly, other pharma majors such as Cipla, Sun Pharma, and Dr Reddy’s were up between 1-2 per cent each.

Among broader markets, Glenmark Pharma was up more than 7 per cent, followed by Granules up over 4 per cent. Lupin, Aurobindo Pharma, Biocon, Ipca Lab, Laurus Labs, and Zydus Life among mid and small-cap pharma stocks were up between 3-4 per cent on the NSE intraday today.

"Due to the high base of FY22, we continue to expect a mid-to-high single-digit growth in Indian Pharma Market (IPM) for FY23E, mainly on the back of price hikes and new launches, which will be partially offset by volume decline," Naman Bagrecha, Research Analyst, Emkay Research said.

Earlier on Wednesday, India's COVID-19 tally climbed to 4,46,76,330 with 131 fresh infections, while the number of active cases came down to 3,408, according to Union health ministry data.

The toll due to the viral disease increased to 5,30,680 with three more fatalities, including two deaths reconciled by Kerala and one reported from West Bengal in the last 24 hours, the data updated at 8AM stated.