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34 deaths, 2,061 cases in south TN, 698 +ve in central dists

Madurai: For the second consecutive day on Friday, southern districts recorded more than 2 ,000 Covid-19 positive cases in total. This includes 2,054 local and seven imported cases taking the total to 37,587. In all, 34 deaths were reported on Thursday, taking the total number of deaths to 477.

In the central region, 698 new cases were reported, pushing the tally to 9,287 till now.

The regional tally jumped from 8,000 plus cases in just two days. The death toll in the region touched 105 with one casualty each from Trichy, Pudukottai, Ariyalur and Nagappattinam districts.

In the south, Madurai recorded the highest number of deaths, followed by Virudhunagar (6), Kanyakumari (5) and Tirunelveli (4). While in the central region, Trichy remained on top with 217 new cases. The total positive cases in the district reached 3,089. Trichy was also on top in the list of casualties with 51 deaths so far.

Thanjavur registered 186 new cases taking the tally to 1,730, while Tiruvarur recorded 96 cases with a tally of 1,156. Nagappattinam which had only four cases on Thursday also witnessed 46 cases taking the total to 523 cases.

A 40 years old male from Sivagangai with diabetes mellitus and systemic hypertension admitted on July 18 and died on Thursday is the youngest death reported in the south on Friday. Two other victims were aged 46 and 49-years-old respectively, while others were aged above 50.

Despite the steep rise in cases, so is recovery. With 21,810 discharged against 15,300 active cases, the recovery rate stands at 58%.

After eight days, Madurai (326) once again recorded over 300 cases in a day. Kanyakumari and Theni with 266 and 234 cases respectively have recorded the highest number of cases in a day. The districts also crossed 3,000 cases on the day with Theni having 3,321 cases and Kanyakumari with 3,124 cases. Kanyakumari took seven days to add the third 1,000 cases, while it took eight days for Theni.

In Kanyakumari, a district with dense population, around 1,000 to 1,500 samples are collected every day. According to district health officials, majority of them are local cases, particularly in Nagercoil Corporation area. “We saw a spread among fishermen communities and fish markets, where people gathered in numbers. Social distancing and wearing of masks is not being followed,” the health official added.

Dean of the government medical college and hospital in Theni M Ilangovan attributed higher turnout of positive cases among contacts as the reason for higher fresh cases. “We increased testing to 1,000 samples per day. Two to three primary contacts were also testing positive. As we are tracing and testing them immediately, there is higher number of cases,” he said.

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