Rise in inter-state travel Covid cases in Karnataka (2nd Ld)
Bengaluru, May 23 (IANS) A spate of Covid positive cases in Karnataka with inter-state travel history continues, even as 196 cases have been reported, the highest single-day rise, raising the state’s tally to 1,959, an official said on Saturday.
“The number of new cases reported from Friday 5 p.m. to Saturday 5 p.m. is 216,” said a health official.
On Saturday, 195 of the 216 cases had inter-state travel history, mostly to Maharashtra, India’s Covid hotspot.
The lion’s share of inter-state travel happened to Maharashtra, 187 out of the 195 cases.
Travel to other states included two cases each from Gujarat, Delhi and Tamil Nadu.
Only 13 of the new cases were contacts of earlier cases.
Unlike earlier days of the pandemic in the state where most new cases were contacts of other cases, currently, most of the new cases have travel history.
Of the new cases, Yadagiri contributed (72), followed by Raichur (40), Mandya (28), Chikkaballapura (26), Gadag (15), Dharwad (5), Hassan and Bengaluru Urban (4 each), Dakshina Kannada, Udupi, Kolar, Ballari, Bidar and Davangere (3 each), Uttara Kannada (2) and Kalaburagi and Belagavi (1 each).
As of Saturday, 1,307 cases are active, isolated in hospitals across the state, 608 got discharged and 42 patients died of Covid-19.
Thirteen patients are admitted in the ICU while 11 patients got discharged on Saturday.
The state has tested 1.96 lakh people for Covid, out of which 1.92 lakh turned negative.
One of the reasons for rising number of cases in the state was because of the increased testing.
Earlier, the state was testing less than 5,000 samples a day and had kept a goal of testing at least 10,000 per day by the end of May.
As part of this increased testing, the state is working towards setting up 60 Covid testing labs.
On Saturday, the state tested 9,670 cases.
Incidentally, Mandya is leading with the highest number of active cases in the state, 211, followed by Bengaluru Urban 124, Davangere, 89, Yadagiri, 87 and Hassan 84 among others.
On Saturday, a 32-year-old man from Bengaluru Urban succumbed to Covid-19.
“Positive case 1,270, a resident of Bengaluru Urban, was admitted to the designated hospital on Tuesday with breathing difficulty. He died on Saturday due to cardiac arrest,” said the official.
The deceased also suffered from comorbidities. His death is Karnataka’s 42nd Covid-19 death and Bengaluru Urban’s 10th.
Another patient died during on Saturday, but due to a non-covid reason — second such death in the state.
“Positive case 1,783 died due to a non-Covid reason,” said the official.
The 55-year-old man from Dakshina Kannada had returned from Maharashtra.
Of the 42 Covid deaths in Karnataka, Bengaluru Urban has seen 10 deaths, followed by Kalaburagi (7), Dakshina Kannada (5) and Davangere and Vijayapura (4 each), and remaining from other districts.
Among 1,947 cases, 9 per cent were senior citizens, 62 per cent men and 38 per cent women. The state’s patient discharge rate has fallen to 31 per cent.
–IANS
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