Tamil Nadu Sees 17% Spike In Covid Deaths, Cases Cross 36,000

Tamil Nadu reported 467 new deaths from COVID-19 on Friday, a 17.6 per cent increase over 397 reported a day ago, as it registered 36,184 new cases in the last 24 hours, the health department's data showed.

The number of new infections was 1 per cent higher than Thursday's 35,579 which was its highest ever.

Chennai logged 109 new deaths compared to 73 a day ago.

However, cases were down 3 per cent to 5,913 from 6,073 on Friday.

There are currently 2,74,629 active coronavirus cases in the state with a positivity rate of 21.8 per cent.

Tamil Nadu has so far reported 19,598 deaths from COVID-19 and 17.7 lakh infections.

Tamil Nadu is among 10 states besides Kerala, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Assam- that reported 76.66 per cent of the new cases registered a day ago, the Union Health Ministry had said.

The ministry said eight states - Karnataka, Maharashtra, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh, currently account for 69.47 per cent of the country''s total active cases.