The State has once again reported a spike in COVID-19 infections. In the 24 hours ending Tuesday morning, 261 new infections were reported, while thankfully there have been no casualties.
Due to the continuous increase in the incidence of infections during the past month, the number of infections reported in the past fortnight increased by 95% compared to the previous fortnight.
In the fortnight between February 17 and March 2, the State witnessed 1,121 cases and only six deaths as 4.2 lakh samples were tested. In the last fortnight between March 3 and March 16, the infections increased to 2,189 and 16 deaths occurred and 5.73 lakh samples were tested during the same period. The number of cases increased by 95.27% an the number of deaths increased by 166%. The number of tests increased by 36.28%. On February 15, the State saw only 30 infections, the lowest in the past 10 months and the daily tally only increased since.
Meanwhile, the number of active cases increased to 1,579 and 125 patients have recovered in the past day. The number of recoveries also increased to 8,83,505 while the recovery rate slightly came down to 99.02%. The death toll remains at 7,185 and the cumulative tally reached 8,92,269.
For the first time in the past three months, the daily positivity rate crossed 1% and reached 1.11% as 23,417 samples were tested in the past day. The overall positivity rate of 1.439 crore samples stands at 6.20%.
Guntur has reported the highest single-day tally of 41 infections in the past day. It was followed by Visakhapatnam (39), Chittoor (37), Krishna (34), East Godavari (28), Anantapur (25), Kurnool (20), Nellore (11), Kadapa (10), Prakasam (7), Srikakulam (6) and West Godavari (3). Vizianagaram reported no new cases.
The district tallies were as follows: East Godavari (1,24,705), West Godavari (94,386), Chittoor (88,142), Guntur (75,973), Anantapur (67,891), Nellore (62,556), Prakasam (62,260), Kurnool (60,985), Visakhapatnam (60,296), Kadapa (55,486), Krishna (49,195), Srikakulam (46,316) and Vizianagaram (41,183).
Meanwhile, 74% of the active cases were in five districts including Chittoor, Krishna, East Godavari, Guntur and Visakhapatnam which have been witnessing a surge in infections of late.
