Positivity rate reaches 7.25% after 17,188 new cases emerge 

VIJAYAWADA: After recording over 20,000 daily spikes for two consecutive days, the state saw its Covid-19 tally rise by 17,188 infections against 1,00,424 samples tested in the 24 hours ending Friday 9 am. With 73 fresh fatalities reported in a day, the gross toll touched 8,519, the latest health bulletin said. The total recoveries went up to 10,50,160 after 12,749 more infected persons got cured.

With the fresh additions, the overall positivity rate shot up to 7.25 per cent from 7.19 per cent a day ago, after 1,71,60,870 sample tests conducted so far returned a total of 12,45,374 positives.  Among the fresh casualties, eleven were reported in Vizianagaram, which did not see any death in recent weeks. Visakhapatnam reported 10 deaths; East Godavari eight; Chittoor seven; Krishna and Guntur six each; Kurnool, West Godavari and Prakasam five each; Nellore and Srikakulam four each; and Anantapur two. No casualties were reported from Kadapa district.

Chittoor reported the highest number of 2,260 fresh infections in the 24 hours; Visakhapatnam 1,868; East Godavari 1,823; Anantapur 1,779 cases; Srikakulam 1,632; Nellore 1,530; and Guntur 1,515. 
The active caseload was fast nearing the two lakh mark. As on Friday, it stood at 1,86,695, out of which 20,960 and 20,924 are in Chittoor and East Godavari alone.