Tamil Nadu on Wednesday recorded 26,981 cases, taking the overall tally to 30,14,235. The total cases included 32 returnees from other countries/states. As many as 17,456 people recovered in the past 24 hours leaving 1,70,661 active infections. With 35 deaths, the toll reached 37,073. The positivity rate stood at 17.91 per cent.
Chennai accounted for the majority of the new infections with 8,007 followed by Coimbatore 3,082 and Chengalpet 2,194 while the rest were spread across other districts. A total of 1,50,635 samples were tested in the last 24 hours and pushed the cumulative number of specimens examined to 5,99,80,920 so far.
The state government will inaugurate a special camp to administer precautionary doses to those people aged above 60 and having co-morbidities on Thursday. The camp will begin at 8 am and will be open till 5 pm.
EPS wants state-run liquor shops to be closed
Leader of Opposition Edappadi K Palaniswami called the ruling DMK double-faced for keeping the TASMAC (state-run liquor shops) open amid the surge in Covid-19 cases. In a statement, Palaniswami said Health Minister Ma Subramanian himself had said that cases are multiplying and the situation will only worsen post the Pongal leave.
“Due to the efforts of the Amma government, the cases were brought under 500 in February 2021. In the first week of May 2020, there were around 775 cases. During that period MK Stalin, the then opposition leader, started a campaign that TASMAC shops were spreading the virus. He and his party functionaries staged protests holding black flags and posters. But now, when more than 24,000 cases are being reported daily, the government is keeping TASMAC open, what kind of justification is this?” he said.
Puducherry adds 1,849 more fresh infections
Meanwhile, Puducherry witnessed 1,849 fresh infections pushing the caseload to 1,42,559. The new cases were identified at the end of the examination of 6,116 samples. The positivity rate reached 30.23 per cent. Puducherry region alone accounted for 1,316 new cases out of the total cases reported on Wednesday while Karaikal had 447 cases, Yanam 58 and Mahe 28.
Three more people succumbed to the infection raising the overall toll to 1896. The active cases stood at 11344 with 11217 patients in home isolation and the remaining 127 in hospitals. As per the bulletin from the health department, 15,08,290 doses have been administered so far and they comprised 912066 first doses, 592743 second, and 3481 booster doses.