New cases drop below 400, tally crosses 21K-mark

Coimbatore: The Covid-19 caseload in the district dropped to a three-week low on Friday when it recorded 394 cases, even as the tally zoomed past the 21,000-mark to 21,233.
At 550, the number of patients discharged from treatment centres was also higher than the fresh cases for the fourth consecutive day on Friday, bringing the active cases down to 3,631. At least 17,259 patients have recovered from Covid-19 in the district so far. The recovery rate now stands at 81%.
The toll, meanwhile, rose to 343 with the state including three more deaths that occurred in the district in the bulletin.
On a positive note, there is a gradual decrease in the number of new cases from the city corporation limits. On Friday, only 66% of the 338 new cases, for which data was available, was reported from the city limits. It was a considerable drop from 85% to 90% of the daily spike in cases that it used to report once.
At least 114 cases were reported from outside the city limits on the day. Of them, 102 were from rural areas, where Thudiyalur and Sulur again topped the list with 17 cases each, followed by Thondamuthur (11).
In the city limits, 13 people were tested positive for the virus from Ondipudur, 10 from Vilankurichi, eight each from Ramanathapuram and Peelamedu, seven from Sowripalayam, six from Saravanampatti, four from Kalapatti, and three each from Kamarajar Road and Saibaba Colony.
Now that the new cases have come down, there would also be a drop in positivity rate, which had come down to 9.54% on Tuesday from 10% on August 31. A health department official, who didn’t want to be identified, said, “The positivity rate is expected to dip to 7% to 8% by next week.” Despite the dip in new cases, officials are testing 4,500 to 5,000 samples a day.