The State’s COVID-19 graph could be hitting yet another plateau, with the graph beginning to show signs of stabilisation over the past two weeks.
Even though the graph rose furiously in the first two weeks, there is a slow down in the growth of new cases .
On Friday, for the third consecutive day, the daily case load in the state crossed the 50,000 mark. Kerala logged 54,537 new cases when 1,15,898 samples were tested in the past 24 hours.
The active case pool now has 3,33,447 patients, of whom, 3.5% are currently admitted in hospitals or field hospitals such as COVID first line/second line treatment centres.
The number of recoveries reported on the day – this includes patients discharged from hospitals, field hospitals and those who completed home isolation – was 30,225.
The Health department’s data says that during January 21-27, the average active cases were 2,70,156, out of which an average of around 0.8 % were admitted in oxygen beds and 0.4% in ICUs. New cases increased by 71 % (1,31,523 cases), while active cases increased by 132% during this period, in comparison to the previous week.
Hospitalisations increased by 107% and ICU occupancy by 57%. Oxygen bed requirement rose by 159% during this period in comparison to the previous week.
Hospitalisations continue to rise in proportion to the increase in new cases and on Friday, 1,629 people were newly admitted to hospitals in the State. Total number of patients admitted with moderate or severe COVID in hospitals in the State has risen to 11,698.
ICU and ventilator occupancy shows a definite rise and on Friday, 87 persons were newly admitted for ICU care, while another 31 persons were put in ventilator support. The current ICU occupancy of COVID patients in both public and private hospitals in the State thus stood at 1297, while ventilator occupancy was 339.
The official case fatality now stands at 52,786, with the State adding 352 deaths to the official list of COVID deaths on Friday.
This includes 13 deaths which occurred in the last 24 hours, 258 deaths which have now been accepted as COVID deaths by the government as per the new guidelines of the Centre and following the appeals filed by families.
The department also declared 81 deaths which occurred much earlier, but which had remained undeclared till now due to incomplete documentation.
The cumulative case burden now stands at 58,81,133 cases.
Among the districts, Ernakulam reported the highest number of new cases with 10,571 cases, followed by Thiruvananthapuram 6,735, Thrissur 6,082, Kozhikode 4,935, Kottayam 4,182, Kollam 4,138, Palakkad 3,248, Malappuram 3,003, Idukki 2,485, Alappuzha 2,323, Kannur 2,314, Pathanamthitta 2,021, Wayanad 1,379 and Kasaragod 1,121.
