THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kerala's daily COVID-19 cases continued to witness a sharp rise with 1,078 people testing positive, a new single day high, on Thursday as the infection count soared past 16,000 while the toll mounted to 50 with five more deaths.
This is the second consecutive day that the fresh positive cases have crossed the 1,000 mark, taking the tally to 16,110.
On Wednesday, the state had logged 1038 cases, the first time it crossed four digits.
As many as 798 people contracted the virus through contact, 219 returned from overseas and other states while the source of infection of 65 patients was not yet known, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said.
The deaths have been reported from Kozhikode, Ernakulam, Parassala, Kollam and Kannur.
The active cases touched9,458while at least 432 were discharged from hospitals after recovery.
A total of 1.58 lakh people are under observation,Vijayan said.
Among the districts which recorded high number of cases on Thursday were Thiruvananthapuram (222), Kollam (106), Ernakulam (100), Malappuram (89), Thrissur (83), Alappuzha (82) and Kottayam (80).
In the last 24 hours, a total of 22,433 samples were sent for testing. As of now, 1.58 lakh people are under observation.