BHUBANESWAR: Bhubaneswar reported 51 new COVID-19 cases pushing the daily caseload in the state to 290, the highest single-day spike this year, and test positivity rate to cross one per cent (pc) in the last 24 hours.
Educational instructions continued to pose a big challenge for the city administration as 25 students from a coaching institute tested positive.
Two more students from IIT-Bhubaneswar also were found to have been infected with coronavirus
taking the total cases on the campus to 10 in the last one week.
Of the 290 fresh cases, up by 38 pc from the previous day's count of 210 cases, the maximum 71 cases were detected in Khurda district, followed by 40 in Nuapada, 21 in Jharsuguda, 16 in Cuttack, 15 in Bargarh, 14 in Sundargarh, 11 in Sambalpur and 10 each in Angul and Mayurbhanj.
As new clusters emerged from different parts of the State, the TPR rose from 0.71 per cent a day before to 1.13 per cent on Saturday.
As many as 25,496 samples were tested during the period.
Additional Chief Secretary of Health department PK Mohapatra said the Covid cases surged in the state mainly after the arrival of people and students from affected states.
"Districts recording a spike in new cases have been directed to monitor all returnees from the high risk states and ensure their testing and aggressive contact tracing of those found positive," he added.
The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Sunday sealed the ALLEN Coaching Institute at Maitree Vihar in Bhubaneswar after the detection of 25 cases from its hostels.
Entry into the hostels of the institute has been banned for all outsiders except designated civic body officials.
The BMC has instructed the institute authorities to isolate all affected students in separate rooms in the hostels and ensure supply of all essentials and medical requirements.
Khurda Collector Sanat Kumar Mohanty said the IIT students, who tested positive are from outside the State, and they were quarantined after their arrival in the city.
In a statement, the IIT-Bhubaneswar said three students were initially tested positive after their arrival between March 20 and 22.
The samples of other students, who had come in contact with them were sent for test and seven among them were found positive.
"All 10 students are now in the isolation centre of the institute and are being taken care of. In view of the positive cases, the institute has postponed the arrival of the next batch of students scheduled for April 4," the statement added.
With this, the tally soared to 3,40,194 of which 3,36,571 patients have recovered and 1920 succumbed. The active cases stand at 1650.