State’s epidemic curve still on its way up

Thursday’s sudden drop in case burden may be a statistical aberration: experts

The State registered 9,250 new cases of COVID-19 on Friday, when 68,321 samples were tested in the past 24 hours, making it clear that the epidemic curve is still on its way up. The test positivity rate has shown a slight dip from 14.6% to 13.5%

Thursday’s sudden and miraculous drop in daily case burden by nearly half the number was either a statistical aberration or some technical goof-ups that could have happened during data upload, experts said.

Chairperson of the government’s expert committee on COVID B. Ekbal clarified that the steep dip in cases and test positivity rate on Thursday was not an indication of the epidemic curve going down but could be a phenomenon that statistical experts call “Statistical Noise” (random irregularity in any real life data). Going by the current trends, the epidemic curve could plateau by October end, he said.

The State’s cumulative burden now stands at 2,68,100. A total of 1,75,304 persons having recovered from the disease, the number of active cases is 91,756.

The State recorded the highest number of recoveries on Friday with 8,048 patients getting discharged from the hospital. There are 650 patients who are critically ill and in ICUs, while another 161 remains on ventilator support.

With 25 more deaths which occurred in the past few weeks being added to the official list of COVID deaths, the cumulative death toll stands at 955 cases. Thiruvananthapuram accounted for seven deaths, four each in Kollam, Ernakulam and Malappuram, two in Alappuzha and one each in Kozhikode, Kasaragod, Kottayam and Thrissur.

Of the new cases reported, 98% or 9,083cases are locally acquired infections, with the authorities unable to establish an epidemiological link in 757 cases. This includes infections reported in 111 health-care workers.

Among districts, three districts recorded over a thousand cases, with Kozhikode on top with 1,205 cases, Malappuram 1,174 and Thiruvananthapuram 1,012 cases. Ernakulam has 911 cases, Alappuzha 793, Thrissur 755, Kollam 714, Palakkad 672, Kannur 556, Kottayam 522, Kasaragod 366, Pathanamthitta 290, Idukki 153 and Wayanad 127.

Ernakulam has the highest number of active cases at 12,405, followed by Thiruvananthapuram 11,731 and Kozhikode 11,121. Rest of the districts have less than 10,000 active cases.

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