Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan today appealed to people to celebrate Eid in the safety of their homes as the state recorded 43,529 fresh Covid cases and its highest daily death count of 95 over the past 24 hours.
Muslims in Kerala completed the month of Ramadan today and will be celebrating Eid tomorrow. The festival will be celebrated in other parts of the country depending upon the sighting of the moon.
As per the state figures, the positivity rate on the 1,46,320 samples tested over the past 24 hours was 29.5 per cent, up from 26.77 per cent reported on Tuesday. A total of 34,600 patients recovered over the past 24 hours.
Among the states badly hit by the second wave of Covid infections in India, Kerala has been consistently reporting a high number of daily cases over the past couple of weeks.
So far, the state has recorded a total of 19,80,879 cases and its cumulative death count stands at 6,053.
Among the districts worst affected in the state are Ernakulam, Malappuram and Kozhikode.
The fresh spike in cases has compelled the state government to impose a lockdown in the state in an attempt to break the chain of transmission and take the pressure off the medical infrastructure.
Earlier this week, Mr Vijayan wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying Kerala cannot spare any further oxygen as they have already supplied their buffer stock to neighbouring states.
The state, he wrote, will allow 40 metric tonnes of oxygen to Tamil Nadu till May 10 as per the May 6 decision of the Central Committee of Oxygen Allocation.
"However, after this it will be practically impossible to allow oxygen to be taken out of the state considering the present situation," Mr Vijayan wrote, citing the high number of active cases in the state.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a press release)
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