Tamil Nadu COVID-19 tally crosses 3,000; Chennai continues to be on top

Tamil Nadu reported its biggest spike in number in a single day on Sunday with swab samples of 261 patients rendering positive, taking the number of cases way past the 3,000 mark. Chennai, the state capital, continues to be the biggest hotspot of coronavirus with 1,458 positive patients, of which 203 cases were reported on Sunday alone.

The state has seen a spurt in the number of positive cases for the past few days as it ramped up its testing capacity – more than 1.50 lakh samples have so far been tested in the state since the coronavirus outbreak began in March. While 1,40,716 individuals have been tested, 9,391 are repeat samples of positive patients and 1,564 samples are under process.

Tamil Nadu effected a major change in its testing policy on April 12 by going in for “aggressive testing” from a strict protocol of testing only symptomatic patients. Since then, it has ramped up its testing capacity and on Sunday alone, the state tested 10,584 samples, one of the highest in the country.

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The state, specifically Chennai, is also witnessing emergence of new clusters with the Koyambedu market being the biggest for now. More than 100 people who went to the market complex, including vendors and labourers, from across the state have tested positive so far.

As of Sunday, the state’s COVID-19 tally is 3,023 including 1,379 discharges and 30 deaths, the latest being a 44-year-old man from Coimbatore. Also, the state which had more recovered patients than active cases for eight days from April 24, reversed the trend on Saturday.

On Sunday, the gap between active patients and those discharged was 232 – the number of active patients stood at 1,611, while the number of discharges were 1,379 – and this is because of the massive increase in the number of patients testing positive for the virus in the past few days.

The city of Chennai is witnessing a greater number of active cases – more than 100 in just a week’s time – whose primary source of contact cannot be conclusively established. Also, the spread of the disease seems to be intense. While it took 36 days for the state to reach the 1,000-mark, it reduced to 16 days for 2,000 cases and just 5 days to reach the 3,000-mark.

However, P Kuganantham, former city health officer and senior epidemiologist, said the city was on the “right track” in controlling the disease as it is testing enough and said there was no need to panic.

“Any epidemic will hit the peak in the third month and that is what is happening here too. I had seen this in cholera, H1N1 and several other viral infections. The only way to contain the disease is to identify the sources and treat them which is what the city is doing now. By isolating the positive patients in huge numbers, the city is preventing community spread,” he told DH.

The epidemiologist also said the city would see increase in numbers till May 15 and would witness a slide after that as testing numbers increase. “Trace, test and treat is what WHO says and that is what is happening extensively here now. People who have infections are being traced, isolated and treated so that they don’t be carriers of the virus,” Dr Kuganantham added.