With record 6,785 fresh Covid-19 cases, Tamil Nadu’s tally nears 2 lakh-mark

CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu recorded a new high of 6,785 fresh Covid-19 cases on Friday, which took its confirmed cases to within nudging distance of two lakh at 1,99,749. Active cases, though much lower at 53,132, have been increasing all week from 50,294 on Sunday. The toll rose to 3,320 with 88 deaths logged.
With 1,299 cases, Chennai continued to be the hotspot, though its share of fresh cases fell to 19%. Out of 92,206 people who tested positive in Chennai, 13,743 are still under treatment in hospitals, Covid care centres and at home. Neighbouring Chengalpet, Kanchipuram and Tiruvallur together recorded 1,116 cases. In these three districts, which have so far reported 28,677 cases, 9,376 people are under treatment.
An epidemiologist with the state government said the R-value or the effective reproduction number, which is the number of people one person can infect, is at 1.24 for Tamil Nadu as of July 13. “For Chennai, it is between 1.09 and 1.12. The daily cases in the city would have been below 1,000 if the R-value had reduced below 1,” the expert said and added that, at present, the case projections for the state were difficult to calculate as the number of daily cases, a critical input for the models to run, is not stable. The number of people tested increased to 63,182 compared to 60,375 on Thursday, 58,475 on Wednesday and 50,055 on Tuesday as the state has started pool testing. The hospital discharges have also increased to 6,504 taking the total number of people now treated and out of hospital at 1,43,297.
The 10 districts in the south logged 2,061 fresh cases, with the most in Virudhunagar at 424. Virudhunagar, which had less than 300 cases exactly a month ago, now has 2,203 active cases. It is followed by Madurai, which has 2,661 active cases, including 326 added on Friday. Tuticorin recorded 313 new cases, taking its active cases to 2,354.
The 16 districts in central and western region of Tamil Nadu together added 1,232 new cases --698 in Central and 534 in western TN -- taking the total active cases to 7,166. Trichy added 217 cases and Thanjavur 186. Coimbatore added 189 to take its active cases to 1,27. Salem reported 122 taking the number of people under treatment to 773.