Tamil Nadu on Thursday registered a slightly lower number of coronavirus positive cases with as many as 447 persons testing positive over the past 24 hours, said the state Health Department.
Chennai:
With this the total tally of coronavirus positive persons in state goes up to 9,674 and the share of the Koyambedu Market corona cluster in the overall tally is over 2,500 persons (primary and their contacts), officials said.
Two Covid-19 patients lost their lives taking the death toll to 66.
The state capital Chennai continued to see the highest number of infections at 363 taking the total tally to 5,637.
The Koyambedu market is one the Asia's largest wholesale markets where about 20,000 persons frequent daily during normal days. A number of positive cases in the neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh have also been linked to this market as their travel history points out.
The Tamil Nadu government has closed the market after persons associated with the market - traders, customers, delivery persons, truck drivers and others- tested positive for coronavirus.
Further hundreds of those who were associated with the market have gone back to their native places in Tamil Nadu where they tested positive for the virus resulting in a huge spike in infection numbers in different districts.
According to the government a total of 11,965 samples were tested taking the total to over 2.80 lakh till date. Testing of 757 samples is under process.
The number of infected children in the age group 0-12 went up to 555. The total number of active cases in Tamil Nadu stands at 7,365.
Meanwhile a committee of medical experts has recommended to the government not to reduce the number of sample tests so that remedial action in those pockets could be taken.
The committee had earlier met Chief Minister K. Palaniswami.
Speaking to reporters Prabhdeep Kaur, Deputy Director, National Institute of Epidemiology said the biggest achievements of Tamil Nadu is testing of large number of persons and the low Covid-19 deaths.
She said the committee has recommended to the government to lift the lockdown only in a phased manner.
After reporting more than 500 cases for nearly 10 days, Tamil Nadu has witnessed a slight dip in the number of positive cases registered.
A total of 509 people had tested positive on Wednesday.
On May 12, the state reported 716 cases while on May 11 it was 798.