For Punjab, May has turned out to be the deadliest month since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic in March last year — witnessing, on an average, 178 deaths and 6,343 fresh cases every day.
Reporting the highest case fatality rate (CFR) in India at 2.56 percent, Punjab has registered whopping 5,528 deaths — accounting for 38 percent of the total casualties due to contagion — in the month of May alone. The figure is 2.5 times higher than the total number of deaths it witnessed inApril.
In fact, May also reported the maximum number of cases, close to two lakh, in a single month. A total of 1,96,634 cases, accounting for 34.64 percent of the total confirmed positive cases, were reported in May.
Punjab witnessed a peak in the second wave on May 8 when it recorded highest ever single day tally of 9042 fresh cases.
However, the state’s daily positivity rate, which was 10.42 on April 30, has now come down to 3.93 percent — the lowest since February.
On Monday, the state reported 2,221 fresh cases, besides 117 deaths, pushing the state’s infection tally to 5,67,607 and death toll to 14550.
With this, the active cases have also come down to 36,433, which is 6.42 percent of the total positive cases. The state had 15.40 percent (total 58,229) active cases on May 1, and highest 17.10 percent (79,963) active cases on May 12.
Among the fresh cases, highest 241 were tested positive in Jalandhar, followed by 223 in Ludhiana, 184 in Bathinda, 164 in Amritsar, 152 in Mansa, 136 in Muktsar, 124 in Patiala, 110 in Hoshiarpur, 93 in Sangrur, 89 in Ferozepur, 88 in Mohali. 81 in Gurdaspur, 78 in Fazilka, 71 in Moga, 64 in Pathankot, 62 in Faridkot, 57 in Ropar, 53 in Kapurthala, 47 each in Barnala and Tarn Taran, 32 in Fatehgarh Sahib, and 25 in Nawanshahr.
Maximum 12 of the total casualties on Monday were reported from Patiala; 11 from Bathinda; nine each from Mohali and Muktsar; eight each from Sangrur, Ludhiana, and Gurdaspur; seven each from Amritsar and Jalandhar; six from Ferozepur; five from Fazilka; four from Mansa; three each from Nawanshahr, Kapurthala, Barnala, and Hoshiarpur; two each from Fatehgarh Sahib and Moga; and one each from Ropar and Tarn Taran.
As far as black fungus is concerned, two people infected with Mucormycosis died while the 21 fresh cases were reported on Monday.