Kerala reported 138 new cases of COVID-19 and 88 recoveries on Monday, keeping the number of active cases in hospitals at 1,540.

While a good number of recoveries and subsequent discharges are helping the Health Department manage its hospital bed requirements now, the situation can change rapidly in the coming days as the epidemic progresses.

When disease transmission intensifies, an exponential increase in hospital admissions can overwhelm the public health system.

On Monday too, except for four cases which were a result of local transmission through contact with known/unknown sources, 134 cases are imported cases of infection brought into the State by people who have returned from abroad and other States.

The fact that one of the cases of local transmission was detected in a security guard at the Medical College Hospital, Thiruvananthapuram, has sent the hospital and the health administration into a tizzy as it is highly likely that he contracted the disease from within the hospital, possibly from one among the innumerable visitors.

It is the second time that people managing the front office at the MCH are contracting COVID-19, possibly from within the hospital. Two weeks ago, it was a nursing assistant manning the COVID outpatient registration counter here who had contracted the disease.

The cumulative number of persons who have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 ever since the outbreak began is 3,310, of whom 1,747 have recovered.

The total number of people put under surveillance and quarantine by the State is 1,47,351, of whom, 2,126 with mild symptoms are isolated in hospitals.

As on Monday, the number of hotspots in Kerala is 112.

Meanwhile, media bulletins issued by the Tamil Nadu State Health Department on its website show that in the past two days alone, 25 persons from Kerala who crossed the border have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2.

In fact, between May 19 and June 22, the number of persons from Kerala who tested positive in Tamil Nadu is 76.

The State government has, however, claimed that it has no official information. Yet, the fact remains that these persons had contracted the disease from within Kerala, from unknown sources and were asymptomatic till they got tested in Tamil Nadu.