Bengal: Almost 3,000 new Covid cases in a day, record 30K tests conducted

A bulk of the latest cases, 60 per cent, and 45 of the deaths were recorded in the epicentre in South Bengal comprising Kolkata, North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas, Howrah, and Hooghly. Kolkata’s toll crossed 1,000 to settle at 1,015.

Among those infected in the capital city was Joint Commissioner of Kolkata Police (Headquarters) Subhankar Sinha Sarkar. He had been running a temperature for the past few days.

“His condition is stable and he is in home isolation.

Those who came in contact with him in the last one week will also undergo tests,” said a police officer.

So far, more than 1,600 Kolkata Police personnel have contracted the virus.

The infection surge continued in Purba Medinipur district, which has the highest active caseload outside the epicentre with 1,222 cases. It saw 111 new cases that took its total case count past 3,000.

InNorth Bengal, which has the highest share of cases outside from the epicentre, a death each occurred in five districts — Alipurduar, Jalpaiguri, Uttar Dinajpur, and Malda, and Darjeeling.

Malda added a massive 208 cases to its load, and saw its active case count rise to 841, 36 more than Darjeeling’s. Only Dakshin Dinajpur reported a reduction in the number of patients during the day.

Meanwhile, according to the health bulletin, the state’s recovery rate climbed to 73.25 per cent, buoyed by the release of 2,497 people from treatment facilities.

Till date, 78,617 patients have recovered from the disease.