On a day when 1,437 persons tested positive for COVID-19 in Tamil Nadu, Chennai’s daily count exceeded 500 after a span of four months. A total of 532 persons tested positive for COVID-19 in the city.
The last time Chennai reported more than 500 cases was on November 15, 2020, (502 cases) after which the cases started to decline steadily. However, fresh coronavirus infections have been on the rise in the past two weeks across the State.
Chennai, its neighbouring districts of Chengalpattu, Tiruvallur and Kancheepuram, along with Coimbatore and Thanjavur, have been accounting for a major chunk of the fresh COVID-19 infections in the State. A number of districts have been recording more cases than usual in the past few days.
On Tuesday, the new cases rose to 149 in Chengalpattu and 146 in Coimbatore. Tiruvallur reported 71 cases, followed by 67 in Thanjavur. There were 51 cases in Kancheepuram and 40 in Madurai.
Among other districts, Salem had 33 cases, Tiruppur 32 and Erode 30.
There were 27 cases each in Kanniyakumari and Vellore and 21 cases each in Nagapattinam and Tiruvarur.
A total of 14 districts had fewer than 10 cases each. Nine returnees — two each from Saudi Arabia, Karnataka, West Bengal and Bihar and one from Assam — also tested positive for the infection. The overall COVID-19 tally reached 8,69,804. The State’s active cases crossed 9,000. A total of 9,145 persons were under treatment for COVID-19, of which 3,441 persons were in Chennai.
The State recorded nine more deaths, taking the toll to 12,618. There were four deaths in Chennai, two each in Chengalpattu and Tiruvallur and one in Nagapattinam.
Among the deceased was a 43-year-old man from Nagapattinam, who had hypertension. He was admitted to a private hospital on March 21 with complaints of fever for six days, cough and difficulty in breathing for two days. He died on March 23 due to severe acute respiratory distress syndrome and COVID-19 pneumonia.
Another 902 persons, including 298 persons in Chennai, were discharged across the State. Till date, 8,48,041 persons have been discharged. In the last 24 hours, 76,128 samples were tested. So far, 1,89,30,484 samples have been tested in the State.
Vaccination update
Another 1,05,157 persons were vaccinated in Tamil Nadu on Tuesday, taking the overall coverage so far to 23,46,107.
A total of 11,665 healthcare workers, 18,776 frontline workers, 36,365 persons aged 45 to 59 years with comorbidities and 38,351 senior citizens were inoculated.
Of this, 8,437 healthcare workers, 10,413 frontline workers, 20,032 persons with comorbidities and 23,357 senior citizens received Covishield. The remaining 3,228 healthcare workers, 8,363 frontline workers, 16,333 persons with comorbidities and 14,994 senior citizens received Covaxin.
In total, 7,16,545 senior citizens, 5,41,237 persons aged 45 to 59 with comorbidities, 5,83,902 healthcare workers and 5,04,423 frontline workers were vaccinated till date.
