The State on Saturday added 26,685 new cases of COVID-19 to its tally when the results of 1,31,155 samples tested over the past 24 hours came in. The test positivity rate showed a slight dip, dropping from 21.78% to 20.35%.
Even this seems to have brought relief in small measure to a State, which saw seven new records in daily case numbers in the past seven days. Six districts reported over 2,000 cases each, while another four had over 1,000 new cases each, indicating that disease transmission, which used to be intense in northern districts, is now beginning to be felt uniformly throughout the State.
ICU admissions have been steadily on the rise with 1,279 critically ill patients being cared for in ICUs, with 370 requiring ventilator assistance. The cumulative case burden now stands at 13,77,186 cases.
The active case pool is poised to hit the two-lakh mark and on Saturday had 1,98,576 patients. This is in sharp contract against the active case load during the first peak in October last, when the number of patients was slightly over 97,000 cases.
The number of patients currently being treated in hospitals is 18,415, with 3,476 new admissions. Large scale testing is thus helping trace and isolate thousands of patients with mild or asymptomatic infections.
At present, a total of 4,13,172 persons are on home or institutional isolation. There were 7,067 recoveries reported. The total recoveries now number 11,73,202.
The addition of 25 new deaths to the toll, took the cumulative toll to 5,080. Kozhikode reported 10 deaths, Thiruvanthapuram, Ernakulam and Wayanad three each, while one death each was reported from Kollam, Pathanamthitta, Alappuzha, Idukki, Thrissur and Malappuram
The active case pool in Ernakulam, went up to 32,164 patients. Of this, 2,043 patients have been hospitalised.
In Thiruvananthapuram, where the active case pool has risen to 14,051 cases, has the highest hospital admissions at 2,270 patients. Pathanamthitta, which has 7,607 active cases, have hospitalised 1,187 patients
Five districts have 2,000 or slightly less hospitalised patients – Ernakulam, Kozhikode, Thrissur, Kottayam and Thiruvananthapuram.
Among districts, Kozhikode reported the highest number of new cases with 3,767 cases, Ernakulam 3,320, Malappuram 2,745, Thrissur 2,584, Thiruvananthapuram 2,383, Kottayam 2,062, Kannur 1,755, Alappuzha 1,750, Palakkad 1,512, Kollam 1,255, Pathanamthitta 933, Kasaragod 908, Wayanad 873 and Idukki 838.
