Ranchi’s Covid-19 count crosses 20K-mark, district records 23% of state’s tally

State capital Ranchi, which is hardest hit by the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic and placed at the top of the list of positive cases, crossed the 20,000-mark on Saturday even as Jharkhand’s tally touched 86,277.

According to the health department’s bulletin of October 3, the state has reported 877 new cases and five deaths in the last 24 hours pushing the tally to 86,277 cases including 10,939 active cases, 74,604 recoveries and 734 deaths.

Ranchi reported 384 new cases taking the district’s tally to 20,053, which accounts for over 23% of the state’s total viral caseload. The district currently has 3,354 active cases, 16,575 recoveries and 124 deaths.

The daily detection of Covid-19 cases in the state is on the decline as Jharkhand, after a hiatus of more than one month, has been reporting less than 1,000 cases for the last two days. On October 2 and 3, it detected 736 and 877 cases respectively.

Ranchi, however, didn’t see such a noticeable decline in the daily detection of cases. On October 2 and 3, the district alone reported 306 and 384 cases, which accounts for over 41% and 43% of the state’s total discovery of 736 and 877 cases respectively.

The district’s positivity rate--the number of cases reported among the total samples tested--stood at over 10%, meaning thereby that of the 100 samples tested; an average of 10 people were found infected.

Compared to the state’s positivity rate, which is around 3.65%, Ranchi’s positivity rate is nearly triple indicating greater spread of the disease.

East Singhbhum with its headquarters in Jamshedpur, which is placed second in the list of Covid-19 cases, is close to the 15,000-mark. With the discovery of 61 new cases and one death on Saturday, the district’s tally touched 14,559. It reported the highest number of deaths as 306 out of 734 fatalities occurred in Jamshedpur alone.

Ranchi and East Singhbhum together yielded 34,612 cases and 430 deaths, which account for over 40% of the total count and 58% of the overall casualties.

The only good news for Jharkhand is its high recovery rate and low mortality rate, which is 86.47% and 0.85%, which is better than the national average of 83.80% and 1.60% respectively.

The state witnessed a steep surge in cases after August 24, when the daily detection of cases remained more than 1000. But, for the last two days, less than 1,000 cases have been detected despite the fact that the pace of testing has not slowed down.