ONGOLE: The daily Covid positivity rate in Prakasam, which reported 1,399 cases on Sunday, has skyrocketed to 63.2 per cent. As the infection has been spreading virulently in many places of the district, the figure is above 60 per cent in Ongole urban and rural mandals, Chimakurthy, SN Padu, Tangutur, Addanki, Kanigiri, Chirala, Donakonda, Jarugumalli, Ballikurava, Martur, Yaddanapudi, Darsi Kandukur and Kothapatnam.
After the gap of a few months, the district is yet again reporting over 1,000 infections every day. On Sunday too, 1,399 infections emerged from 2,215 sample tests, pushing the aggregate cases to 1,45,047 out of which 5,955 are active. With one more death, the Covid toll stood at 1,132.So far, over 75 teachers and 20 students have tested positive across the district, where five Omicron cases have emerged. However, all patients of the new variant have recovered, officials said. Due to the worrying trend, the district officials have decided to ramp up the daily testing 7,000.
Meanwhile, the district has administered 29,31,695 first dose, 25,36,216 second dose jabs and 34,519 precautionary vaccine jabs. On Sunday, 5,999 people were vaccinated at 169 session sites. Dr P Ratnavali, DMHO, said at present around 4,500 patients are in home isolation, while 300 others were undergoing treatment in government hospitals and Covid Care Centers. “Our focus has been on early recovery of people in home isolation for which special medical teams have been tasked with their regular monitoring.”