With 26 more testing positive for SARS-CoV-2 on Thursday, the State continued to saw a surge in COVID-19 cases.
Briefing mediapersons here, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan warned the public that it was a sign of the state of affairs in the offing as Kerala grappled with the influx of expatriates from nations and States where intense disease transmission was on. While the case numbers were expected to grow in the coming days, the State was also confident of facing the challenge, he added.
Kasaragod accounted for 10 cases, Malappuram five, Palakkad and Wayanad three each, Kannur two, and Pathanamthitta, Idukki, and Kozhikode one case each. Of the 26 new cases, 14 are imported cases of infection, with seven persons having returned from abroad, while the rest from other parts of the country.
Eleven persons are believed to have acquired the infection by local transmission through their contact with a known or unknown sources of COVID-19. One case in Idukki was picked up from the community through sentinel surveillance. These 11 cases include two health-care workers and one policeman who had been on duty in Wayanad.
Wayanad a hotbed
Wayanad, which remained free of COVID-19 cases for 32 days in a row, has become a hotbed of transmission following the return of an inter-State truck driver from Koyambedu market in Chennai.
So far 10 positive cases, including three police personnel, have been linked to this person, apart from innumerable persons, including 43 police officers, who are now in quarantine.
Kerala’s total tally of cases now stands at 560, out of which, only 64 are currently undergoing treatment. A total of 36,910 persons are now under the State’s surveillance, of whom 36,362 are quarantined in homes while 548 persons with mild symptoms are isolated in hospitals.
MPs, MLAs quarantined
In a related development, three Congress MPs, two MLAs had been asked to remain in quarantine after a 40-year-old man who reached the Walayar check-post on May 9 tested positive for SARS-CoV-2.
