The central team sent from New Delhi to Kerala to look into the Covid-19 situation of the state on Friday said there are many concerns regarding Kerala's Covid-19 situation. The sustained rise in the positivity rate is one. "Let us discuss this with the state. It's a comprehensive situation. Let us see how things unfold," Dr Sujeet Kumar Singh, director of the National Centre for Disease Control said.
For the fourth consecutive day, Kerala on Friday reported more than 20,000 fresh infections, which is 50 per cent of India's total single-day Covid-19 tally as the country at present is reporting around 40,000 daily cases. With 20,772 fresh cases, the test positivity rate in Kerala has risen to 13.61 per cent. In the last 24 hours, Kerala tested 1.52 lakh samples and vaccinated nearly 5 lakh people.
Of the new cases, 81 are health workers, 137 had come from outside the state and 19,622 were infected through contact with the source of contact being not clear in 932 cases, the release said.
Why are Kerala Covid cases increasing? Study says every 100 people spreading infection to 111
The situation in Kerala has become the centre of a political blame game as the BJP leaders have put the onus of the spike on the Pinarayi Vijayan government as he had relaxed some restrictions during Eid-Al-Adha. Reports claimed the union health secretary has written a letter to the state government specifying some superspreader events before the increase in the number of cases. Kerala health minister Veena George dismissed any such letter and said that was a campaign going on against Kerala, while many other states commended Kerala for its handling of the pandemic.
{{/usCountry}}The situation in Kerala has become the centre of a political blame game as the BJP leaders have put the onus of the spike on the Pinarayi Vijayan government as he had relaxed some restrictions during Eid-Al-Adha. Reports claimed the union health secretary has written a letter to the state government specifying some superspreader events before the increase in the number of cases. Kerala health minister Veena George dismissed any such letter and said that was a campaign going on against Kerala, while many other states commended Kerala for its handling of the pandemic.
{{/usCountry}}Kerala health minister said the spike is owing to the increase in the number of tests and also because of the Delta variant which is more transmissible than any other variant.
The 4th serosurvey by the Indian Council of Medical Research has found out that Kerala has the least exposure to the infection with only 44 per cent people having antibodies against SARS-CoV-2. CPM leaders credited this low exposure to Kerala's successful restrictive measures for which, they said, many people did not develop antibodies.