With healthy recoveries reported every day, the number of active cases of Covid-19 infection has dropped below 100 in at least 16 of 24 districts in Jharkhand, figures released by the health department highlighted on Saturday, a day when as many as 474 people were found infected across the state.

As per government data, the number of active cases in Jharkhand increased slightly on the day after only 367 Covid patients recovered against the nearly 500 fresh cases in 24 hours. However, only Ranchi, East Singhbhum, Khunti, Saraikela, Gumla, Deoghar and Bokaro had more than 100 active cases of infection by Saturday night. As many as 5,302 people were battling the virus across the state on Saturday, figures compiled by the National Health Mission (NHM) showed.

Covid fatalities have reduced in the past 48 hours in Jharkhand. On Saturday, one patient died during treatment in Dhanbad, taking the toll to 884, government data stated. No Covid casualties occurred on Friday. As per government data, the Covid mortality rate in Jharkhand was 0.83 per cent against the national average of 1.50 per cent.

The government on Saturday tested swab samples of as many as 80,003 people from across the state and less than 500 of them tested positive. The findings indicate that only 0.62 per cent of the total people tested were found infected. On an average, health workers have been testing 35,000 people every day for Covid-19 this week.

With 139 fresh cases of infection, Ranchi was the only district that reported a triple-digit spike in the Covid caseload on Saturday. Bokaro reported 73 cases, while East Singhbhum and Dhanbad reported 61 and 31 cases respectively. The number of active cases of Covid-19 infection in Ranchi rose to 1,742 on the day as only 101 patients recovered from the viral infection here. East Singhbhum also reported fewer recoveries than fresh cases, which took the active cases there to 1,335.

So far, government agencies and private labs have collected swab samples of 33.71 lakh people and tested 33.62 lakh of them across Jharkhand. Of the over 33 lakh people tested, as many as 1,01,761 were found infected, highlights government data.

As per figures compiled by NHM, the growth rate of the virus in Jharkhand was 0.33 per cent against the national average of 0.56 per cent. The doubling rate of the infection in the state was 209.2 days against the national doubling rate of 122.4 days. The Covid-19 recovery rate in Jharkhand was put at 93.92 per cent, which is higher than the national average of 91.30 per cent.