Active Covid cases drop, total toll crosses 8,000 - Recovery rate rose to 92.72 per cent.

The state’s recovery rate has been rising for 31 consecutive days, inching closer to the national rate of 93.66

With 44,653 tests on Sunday, the state’s total test count went past 55.22 lakh, at 61,366 tests per million people. - File picture

Meghdeep Bhattacharyya   |   TT   |   Calcutta   |    23.11.20 :   Bengal on Sunday reported a drop in its total active Covid-19 cases for the 27th consecutive day, aided by 3,726 recoveries that outnumbered 3,591 new infections detected, as the recovery rate rose to a new high of 92.72 per cent.

Bengal has a total of 25,207 active Covid cases now, compared to 37,190 on Dashami. 

However, the state’s Covid-19 toll reached 8,025, with 49 deaths reported on Sunday. Bengal stands fifth among states with the most Covid-19 deaths, after Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Delhi.

Since Bengal’s first Covid-19 death was reported on March 23, it took 244 days for the toll to cross 8,000.

“The latest 1,000 deaths took 19 days, which is slower, and hence better than 16-17 days it took for the previous few thousands,” said a minister. Before this, Bengal had logged 500 deaths by June 17, 1,000 by July 15, 2,000 on August 8, 3,000 by August 27, 4,000 by September 14, 5,000 by October 1, 6,000 by October 18 and 7,000 by November 3.

Of the deaths, 6,707 or 83.6 per cent were attributed to comorbidities by the state government. The state’s mortality rate is now 1.75 per cent, worse than the national figure of 1.46, but better than its own 1.85 since Vijaya Dashami on October 26. “Mortality in infected men was 2.09 on Dashami. It is 2.01 today (Sunday). In infected women, it was 1.45, and is 1.34 now,” said the minister.

The 49 deaths reported on Sunday included 15 from the city, which now has over 2,500 deaths and more than 31 per cent of Bengal’s death toll.

The state’s total Covid-19 cases is over 4.63 lakh, including 4.23 lakh recoveries. 

The state’s recovery rate has been rising for 31 consecutive days, inching closer to the national rate of 93.66. Since Dashami, the state logged over 1.11 lakh recoveries, outweighing the 1.02 lakh cases found.

Calcutta High Court had intervened to prevent a worsening of the pandemic over Durga Puja, and the numbers of infections from that time showed that the intervention was effective. The high court issued a similar set of instructions for Kali Puja, Diwali and Chhath.

With 44,653 tests on Sunday, the state’s total test count went past 55.22 lakh, at 61,366 tests per million people. The positive confirmation rate is 8.26 per cent.

The state reported 28.89 per cent occupancy in the 13,508 beds earmarked for Covid-19 in the 101 dedicated Covid hospitals, besides over 4.72 lakh telemedicine consultations so far during this pandemic.