India posts 585 COVID deaths in 24 hours - 482 from Kerala alone

India on Wednesday posted a sudden spurt in COVID fatalities, with 585 deaths on record in the last 24 hours, according to data from the Union health ministry. Of these, Kerala reported the highest number of deaths at 482 as it added the backlog of data in the national tally.

“For Kerala, as per state media bulletin: 53 deaths reported on 25th October +9 deaths declared as per appeal G.O.(Rt) No.2110/2021/H&FWD + 219 deaths declared as per appeal G.O.(Rt) No.2219/2021/H&FWD,” the website said.

Kerala made news in the last few month over its surging COVID numbers, sparking concern among government and medical circles.

The majority of the worst-affected districts across the country are in Kerala, according to central government figures. Though the daily count of infection has come down in the southern state, it is still recording more than half of India’s COVID caseload every day.

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On Wednesday, India reported 13,451 new cases of the infection, of which Kerala reported 7,163. Active cases account for 0.48 per cent of total cases, which is the lowest since March 2020, the government release said. A decrease of 1,155 cases was recorded in active caseload in a span of 24 hours.

The daily rise in new coronavirus infections has been below 30,000 for 33 straight days and less than 50,000 daily new cases have been reported for 122 consecutive days. The daily positivity rate was recorded at 1.03 per cent. It has been less than 2 per cent for the last 23 days. The weekly positivity rate was also recorded at 1.22 per cent.

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