14 deaths push Covid toll nears 500-mark, 10 districts report 100+ cases

Ranchi: With 14 Covid 19 casualties in 24 hours, the death toll in Jharkhand touched 496 on Tuesday. Going by the current trends, the toll is likely to surpass the 500-mark on Wednesday. Jharkhand last reported less than five fatalities in one day on August 10. Of the 14 deaths, five were in East Singhbhum district, four in Ranchi, two in West Singhbhum and one each in Khunti, Godda and Hazaribag on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, ten of 24 districts reported three-digit figures in terms of new infections as the state recorded its second highest single-day spike of cases since the pandemic broke out on March 31. with 2,652 new infections. On August 31, 3,218 new infections were detected across the state.
While a little over 11,000 cases were reported across the state in between March 31 and July 31, a total of 13,527 new infections have been reported in the first eight days of this month. The cumulative Covid caseload in Jharkhand now stands at 55,296, of which 15,438 are active and 39,362 have recovered (including 1,812 patients discharged from hospitals on Tuesday).
East Singbhum, which has emerged as the worst affected district in terms of deaths, reported 475 new cases on Tuesday. Bokaro (335 new infections), Hazaribag (210), West Singhbhum (127) and Simdega (127) recoded their biggest one-day spikes in new infections. Among others, Koderma recorded 294 cases, Seraikela-Kharsawan reported 248, Ranchi 210 cases followed by Dhanbad (192) and Ramgarh (165).
Jharkhand’s weekly growth rate stood at 3.36% on Tuesday, higher than the national average of 2.16%. The state integrated disease surveillance program cell said 84,398 samples were tested on Tuesday. The state’s testing on Tuesday was almost at par with the number of samples collected (86,937).