Kerala records highest single-day spike of 13,835 Covid cases

Thiruvananthapuram, April 17 (SocialNews.XYZ) Kerala on Saturday recorded its highest ever single-day tally of Covid-19 cases at 13,835, after 81,211 samples were sent for testing in the past 24 hours.

The state's test positivity rate surged to a high of 17.04 per cent on Saturday.

Earlier in the day, Kerala Health Minister K.K. Shailaja had given enough hints that the numbers will surge as augmented testing is being conducted for the past two days.

"We are expecting the number of positive cases to go up as around 2.30 lakh tests are expected to take place. Since our health system is quite fine-tuned to handle the positive cases, there is no need to worry as the hospitals are fully equipped," Shailaja said.

"We now need another 50 lakh doses of vaccine as we are now left with around 5.50 lakh doses only. We are expecting fresh supplies at the earliest," added Shailaja.

Meanwhile, a total 3,654 people recovered from the disease in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of recoveries in the state to 11,35,921. Kerala presently has 80,019 active cases.

As many as 27 persons succumbed to the virus in the past 24 hours, mounting the state's Covid death toll to 4,904.

Across the state, 2,18,542 persons are under observation, including 10,539 persons in different hospitals.

With 18 new hotspots being added to the list, Kerala presently has 452 hotspots across the state.

The authorities have asked all those who are conducting weddings or other functions to register in the online portal, and maintain the cap of 75 people for indoor events and 150 for outdoor functions.

Source: IANS