BHUBANESWAR: The daily COVID-19 infections in Odisha dropped below 1,000 - for the first time in 110 days - on Tuesday when the State registered 987 cases. The last lowest 1,078 cases were recorded on July 21. The new infections spread across 29 districts barring Gajapati. With 107 fresh cases, Sundargarh was the only district to register more than 100 cases.
However, the Health and Family Welfare department has warned the districts not to reduce the number of tests and continue the daily target of 52,000 till the end of winter. "It is indeed a positive outcome that the cases have dropped below 1000. But our target is to bring down the number of cases to single digit in high burden districts," Additional Chief Secretary PK Mohapatra said.
With 43,409 tests in last 24 hours, the State went past 50 lakh tests in nearly eight months. The daily caseload is constantly on the decline since October 13 and dropped below 2,000 on October 18.
The number of new cases halved during the period from September 11 to October 10 and October 11 to November 10. The State recorded 1,06,376 cases in the September-October period as against 54,087 cases in the October-November period.
However, the number of fatalities continued to rise despite the drop in rate of positivity. While 401 deaths were reported during the September-October period, the death toll was 448 in the October-November period. With 13 more patients succumbing to the disease, the death toll soared to 1507.
Districts where cases are still detected in significant numbers include Khurda (86), Angul (86), Cuttack (85) and Mayurbhanj (84). The number of cases in Khurda crossed 50,000 mark while the total number of cases in the State rose to 3,03,780.
The active cases now stand at 11,136 after 1448 patients recovered on Tuesday. So far 2,91,137 patients have recovered. The cumulative positivity rate stands at 6.04 per cent.