Covid tally breaches 3.5 mn-mark in Tamil Nadu with 2,537 new cases

Tamil Nadu on Sunday continued to report a decline in new COVID-19 cases with 2,537 people testing positive in the last 24 hours, including four returnees from domestic and overseas, pushing the tally to a grim 35,01,529 till date, the health department said.

There were no fresh fatalities and the overall death toll remained unchanged at 38,028, a medical bulletin said here.

Daily coronavirus infections have been declining in Tamil Nadu since Saturday.

After several weeks, the number of those recuperated from the virus eclipsed new infections with 2,560 people getting discharged in the last 24 hours, aggregating to 34,44,682 leaving 18,819 active infections.

As many as four districts accounted for the majority of new cases with Chennai at 804, Chengalpet 434, Tiruvallur 151, Coimbatore 119 while the remaining was spread across other districts. After reporting new cases in single digit, Tirupathur recorded zero new cases.

The state capital leads among districts with 6,989 active infections and overall 7,71,464 coronavirus cases.

A total of 34,469 samples were tested in the last 24 hours, pushing the cumulative number of tests so far to 6,74,67,794 the health bulletin said.

Meanwhile, Minister for Health and Family Welfare Ma Subramanian said the health department has administered 94.68 per cent first dose of vaccination and 85.47 per cent second dose to those aged 18 years and above till Saturday.

Talking to reporters after inspecting the mass vaccination camp in Virudhunagar, he said 94.27 per cent people in the district were administered with first dose and 88.78 per cent second dose.

"Among districts, Virudhunagar has topped to cover 88.78 per cent of its population with second dose of vaccination," he said.

To a query, he said the health department has planned to set up 25 primary health centres and 25 urban health care facilities in the state. "Information about the health care facilities like location will be announced later," he said.