Chennai, Jun 5 (UNI) Tamil Nadu on Friday recorded 1,438 new COVID-19 positive cases, the highest number in a day so far pushing the tally to 28,694, while the death toll increased to 232 with 12 more patients succumbing to the pandemic.
Health Minister C Vijayabaskar said 861 patients were discharged after treatment during the last 24 hours and so far a total of 15,762 infected people have been cured.
Presently, there were 12,697 persons being treated, including those in isolation wards and all of them were under active medical supervision.
He said the recovery rate is 54.93 percent and the mortality rate is 0.80 percent, the lowest in the country.
The Minister said a total of 5,35,254 persons were tested till date that included today's 14,968. We are doing the highest number of COVID-19 tests in the country due to the highest number of labs. At present there were 74 labs in the State that included 44 government and 30 private labs.
Dismissing the allegations that the state is under-estimating the spread of Coronavirus details, Mr.Vijayabaskar said the health department is releasing the details in a transparent manner.
He said the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had given its nod to Tamil Nadu government to begin clinical trials of BCG vaccine to treat Coronavirus infected patients and the trials will commence very soon.
Of the total 232 deaths so far, 178 were reported in Chennai alone, followed by Chengalpattu 14, Thiruvallur 11, Kancheepuram 4, Madurai 3, two each in Dindigul, Theni, Thiruvannamalai, Thoothukudi, Vellore and Villupuram, one each in Coimbatore, Cuddalore, Erode, Kanyakumari, Namakkal, Pudukottai, Ramanathapuram, Tirunelveli, Tiruchirapalli and Airport Quarantine.
Chennai continued to top coronavirus infections in the State, as the overall positive cases stood at 19,826, he said.
Next to Chennai, the Chengalpattu district reported 1,624 cases, followed by Thiruvallur 1,191, Thiruannamalai and Kancheepuram each 483, Cuddalore 474, Tirunelveli 382, Ariyalur 374, Villupuram 363, Thoothuludi 306 and rest cases in other places.
Mr.Vijayabaskar said till date, a total number of 5,60,673 samples of persons have been taken and sent for testing of which 28,694 people tested positive, 5,31,295 persons tested negative, while testing of 684 samples of people were under process.
UNI GV-GSM CS 2052