As many 16 returnees from the United Kingdom, where a new variant of Coronavirus was detected recently, tested positive in RT PCR tests conducted on their arrival in Maharashtra from the UK, even as the number of infections dipped to 2854 and deaths in Maharashtra came down to 60 on Saturday.
The State health authorities, who have been subjecting the passengers arriving from the UK to RTPCR tests ever since the detection of a new strain of the SARS-CoV-2 there, have so far 1122 passengers.
Of those tested, 16 were diagnosed positive for Covid-19. Of those tested positive, four are from Nagpur, three each from Mumbai and Thane, two from Pune and one each from Nanded, Ahmednagar, Raigad and Aurangabad.
“The samples of positive patients will be sent to the National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune for genomic sequencing,” a state health official said.
“Close contacts of all positive patients are being traced. Till today, out of 72 close contacts traced, two have tested positive for Covid-19,” the official added.
Meanwhile, with 2854 fresh infections reported on Saturday, the total number of infections in Maharashtra climbed from 19,13,382 to 19,16,236. Similarly, with 60 new deaths, the Covid-19 toll in the state rose from 49,129 to 49189.
As 1926 patients were discharged from the hospitals across the state after full recovery, the total number of people discharged from the hospitals since the second week of March this year went up to 18,07,824. The recovery rate in the state dropped marginally from 94.4 per cent to 94.34 per cent.
With 12 new deaths, the total number of deaths went up from 11,056 to 11,068, while the infected cases rose by 534 to trigger a jump in the total infections from 289800 to 290336.
Meanwhile, the number of “active cases” total cases in the state rose from 56,823 to 58,091 . The fatality rate in the state stood at 2.57 per cent.
Pune district, which continued to be the worst-affected city-district in Maharashtra, saw the total number of cases increase from 3,69,631 to 3,70,049 while the total number of deaths in Pune increased from 7721 to 7725.
Thane district remained in the third spot --after Pune and Mumbai – after the total number of infections rose from 2,52,273 to 2,52, 629, while the total deaths climbed from 5540 to 5547.
Of the 1,24,51,919 samples sent to laboratories, 19,16,236 have tested positive (15.39 per cent) for COVID-19 until Saturday.Currently, 4,64,121 people are in home quarantine while 3,704 people are in institutional quarantine.