BENGALURU: For the first time through the pandemic, 28 of the 30 districts of Karnataka listed on the state health department data sheet (Vijayanagar is part of Ballari) have recorded no additions to their respective COVID-19 tallies.
Bengaluru Urban - which has throughout the pandemic spearheaded the surge in the state - recorded 49 cases, while Belagavi recorded just one, taking fresh COVID-19 cases in the state up by 50 to reach a tally of 39,45,660. Interestingly, in what is a strong indicator to the pandemic fading out completely, the state has scored a hat-trick in reporting zero deaths on the third consecutive day.
The COVID-19 death toll has remained stationary at 40,054 over the past three days, although the mortality rate has remained just a notch above the 1 per cent mark (at 1.01 per cent). The health department had aimed to bring the mortality rate below the 1 per cent mark in an effort to minimise deaths.
Of the total Covid-19 death toll, the first wave of the pandemic (March 2020 to January 2021) claimed approximately 12,400 lives; the second wave (March 2021 to December 2021) claimed about 25,900 lives; while the third wave (January 2022 till date) claimed about 1,700 lives.
The third wave of the pandemic lasted just for three months. The low death count in this wave is being attributed to a significantly less severe Omicron variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and increasing vaccination cover among the state's population.