Chennai: Even before the Tamilnadu government’s official health bulletin, which would normally be released late in the evening, could arrive, information reaching from various parts of the State indicate that Covid-19 cases are witnessing a huge increase today.
According to sources, eight staff of DGP office in the city have tested positive for Covid-19, while 14 members of a family at Velacheri in Chennai have been affected.
In Ariyalur, a whopping 168 persons have been tested positive, while 29 more were found affected in Kancheepuram. Majority of them have links to Koyambedu vegetable, fruits and flowers market. Two more staff of Amma Canteen have also tested positive, sources said and added that they belong to an eatery near Broadway. In Thiruvannamalai, a woman who was tested positive for Covid-19 died today.
For the second day on Tuesday, the number of corona cases in Tamilnadu went beyond 500 taking the tally past the 4,000 mark, including 2,000-plus in Chennai. On a single day count, the number of cases crossed the 500-mark for
the second day in succession with 508 cases (353 men, 154 women and a transperson) as a total of 4,058 people have tested positive so far that included 2,745 men, 1,311 women and two transpersons.
The release said a majority of the cases were linked to the single largest cluster — Koyambedu Wholesale vegetable market in the city, from where the number of those testing positive continued to be on the upswing for the last couple of days.
Of the 508 cases reported in 12 districts (signifcant increase in the number of cases in districts when compared to last few days) Tuesday, Chennai topped with 279 positive cases (again a single day high) and most of them were linked to Koyambedu market, taking the city’s corona tally past 2,000 at 2,008.
Earlier in the day, Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami told officials that only Tamilnadu has as high as 50 labs to conduct COVID-19 tests and added that the number of people being tested has also been increased. The government later updated the number of labs as 52 (36 in government and 16 others in private sector) following two private labs getting permission for testing coronavirus.
“Daily about 12,000 people are being tested and only due to such a high number of tests is the number of those turning positive also on the rise,” he said.
Palaniswami said the public need not fear over more people testing positive as anti-COVID-19 initiatives were being pursued on all fronts, including prevention. He said rice ration card holders would get essential commodities free of cost in June as well, like in the months of April and May.