VIJAYAWADA: Active Covid-19 cases in Andhra Pradesh crossed the one lakh mark with 14,669 new infections emerging in the 24 hours ending Wednesday 9 am—the highest single-day spike this year, the state government said. New fatalities, too, were higher with 71 patients succumbing in the period against 64 on Tuesday.
By adding 2,000 new infections for the second consecutive day, Guntur became the third district after East Godavari and Chittoor where the caseload has crossed one lakh. Chittoor added 1,975 infections in the 24 hours; the spike of 486 was the lowest in Krishna district, where the tally crossed 60,000.
More than 74,000 samples were tested in the state for the second consecutive day. Seven districts reported over 1,000 new infections, taking the overall caseload to 10.69 lakh. So far, more than 79,000 people in Anantapur, 70,000 in Prakasam, 76,000 in Vizag, 79,000 in Nellore and 97,000 in West Godavari have tested positive for Covid-19. Principal secretary (health) Anil Kumar Singhal said the positivity rate (for Wednesday) stood at 19.62 per cent, and the mortality rate 0.42 per cent. The overall positivity rate and mortality rate stood at 6.59 per cent and 0.74 per cent, respectively.
The recovery of 6,433 people on Wednesday took the cumulative recoveries to 9.54 lakh. The surge in the new infections saw to that the active cases reach 1.07 lakh, 14,000 of which are in Chittoor alone, and 10,000 each in Guntur and West Godavari. West Godavari has the lowest active caseload of 2,504.
Nellore district reported the highest of nine fatalities; Krishna eight; Anantapur, East Godavari and Vizianagaram seven each; Chittoor and West Godavari six each; Visakhapatnam five; Guntur and Kurnool four each; Prakasam and Srikakulam three each; and Kadapa two.