Improbable as it may seem, it does look like the growth of the COVID-19 case graph is slowing down in the State, a direct result of the stringent lockdown-like restrictions in the State and the manner in which public is responding to the extraordinary crisis they face.
“The case numbers will continue to grow but the growth of the epidemic curve is slowing down, except may be in two or three districts. It effectively means that while the graph will continue to rise, the peak will not be as steep as we thought it is going to be. The control measures and containment efforts and people’s compliance to government’s efforts will have to be continued at a substantially higher measure for the graph to stabilise,” a senior Public Health professional said.
That said, the situation in the field continues to be grim, as oxygen beds and ICUs are getting filled up. Rise in ICU admissions, the real indicator of the intensity of the pandemic is becoming evident in the State, with 118 more critically ill persons newly entering ICUs on Saturday. The State has 1,808 persons in ICUs now, with 650 of them requiring ventilator assistance.
The State added 35,636 new COVID cases to its tally on Saturday when 1,46,474 samples were tested in the past 24 hours.
The average test positivity rate in the State has not gone beyond 25% since the past three-four days and slowed a slight reduction , at 24.33% on Saturday. The active case pool of the State, which crossed the three lakh mark, is now 3,23,828.
The number of COVID patients currently being treated in hospitals in the State is 25,326, with 4,675 patients getting newly admitted in various hospitals on Saturday.
At present, a total of 6,62,517 persons have been put on home or institutional isolation in the State.
On Saturday, 15,493 patients were declared to have recovered from COVID. Thanks to the new discharge policy that has done away with testing before discharge, the State is able to let off a large number of people much earlier from hospitals. The total recoveries till date is 12,77,294.
The cumulative case burden of the State ever since the pandemic began, now stands at 16,06, 819 cases.
On Saturday, the State added 48 new deaths over the past few days to its official COVID toll, taking the cumulative toll of COVID fatalities in the State to 5,356 deaths.
This included 20 deaths reported from Thrissur, 15 from Palakkad, five frim Kopllam, three from Kannur, two from Thiruvananthapuram, and one death from Malappuram.
Thiruvananthapuram and Ernakulam districts have over 3,200 hospitalised patients. Except for three, all other districts have at least 1000-1,500 hospitalised patients.
Among districts, Kozhikode reported the highest number of new cases with 5,554 cases, Ernakulam 5,002, Thrissur 4,070, Malappuram 3,354, Thiruvananthapuram 3,111, Alappuzha 2,536, Kottayam 2,515, Palakkad 2,499, Kollam 1,648, Kannur 1,484, Pathanamthitta 1,065, Kasaragod 1,006, Idukki 978 and Wayanad 814 cases.
