New COVID-19 cases breached the 4,000 mark yet again in the State and on Wednesday, Kerala reported 4,083 new cases when 22,672 samples were tested in the last 24 hours.
The test positivity rate was 18.01% . Active cases now stand at 28,635.
On Wednesday, 15 deaths (including eight appeals) were added to the State’s official COVID-19 toll. The pandemic has so far claimed 70,008 lives in the State. Hospitalisations remain at a low.
Even though COVID-19 cases seemed to be on the rise in the State, the increase is not reflected in the hospitalisation and ICU admission rates, Health Minister Veena George said.
Of the 27,991 active cases (as on Tuesday), the number hospitalised was only 1,285. Only 239 persons were in the ICUs and 42 were in ventilators.
COVID-19 seemed to be a serious affliction for the elderly, those with co-morbidities and those who were unvaccinated, and hence these categories of people should take extreme care to safeguard themselves from COVID, Ms. George said.
The Health department was closely monitoring the situation in all districts, especially in Ernakulam and Thiruvananthapuram, where the daily new cases crossed the 1,000 mark.
She said that people cannot live in the fear of COVID all the time but individual care and behaviour modification was important to keep the number of cases down. Those who were yet to get vaccinated should complete their vaccination immediately. All children above 12 years should be vaccinated and reverse quarantine—protecting the elderly—should be implemented strictly.
