CHENNAI: Amid a rise in Covid-19 cases in the country, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan on Friday wrote a letter to health secretaries of eight states, including Tamil Nadu, instructing them to strengthen Covid-19 surveillance.
In his letter to health secretary P Senthilkumar, Bhushan said, Tamil Nadu has reported an increase in weekly cases from 356 a week ending April 13 to 510 on April 20. The state reported a positivity rate of 6% in the week ending April 19, which is higher than India’s positivity rate of 5.5% during the same period.
Bhushan said 11 districts reported a positivity rate higher than 10% and 12 districts reported a positivity rate between 5% to 10% in the week ending on April 19. Meanwhile, on Friday the state reported 528 positive cases and two deaths and the test positivity rate was 7.8%.