Over a dozen Covid casualties reported in Ranchi on Sunday took the Covid toll in the district above 300, while over 1000 fresh cases of infection took the active caseload here close to 7000, figures released by the health department on Sunday night revealed.

As per a bulletin released by the National Health Mission (NHM), as many as 2,296 people, including 1076 from Ranchi alone, were found infected by the Covid-19 virus in Jharkhand on Sunday. At least 635 Covid patients also recovered on the day, but the active caseload still jumped to 13,933, the NHM stated in the bulletin.

The state reported 21 Covid casualties on the day, and at least 14 of these victims were residents of Ranchi. Sunday’s findings took the Covid toll in Ranchi to 309 and that in Jharkhand to 1213, NHM data highlighted. East SInghbhum, which has reported the highest number of Covid casualties among the districts in Jharkhand, also reported four Covid deaths on the day, which took the toll there to 371.

The active caseload in East Singhbhum crossed the 1500 mark on the day as the district reported 362 cases against 131 Covid recoveries in 24 hours. As per NHM data, as many as 1,571 East Singhbhum were battling a Covid-19 infection by the end of Sunday. The count of active patients in Ranchi, however, was much higher at 6,701, which is almost half of the total active cases in Jharkhand.

As per government data, over 1.39 lakh people have been infected by the mysterious virus in Jharkhand so far and 89,13 per cent of them have recovered. The growth rate of infection has increased to 1.19 per cent in Jharkhand against the national average of 0.74 per cent, while the doubling rate in the state has dropped to 58.73 days against the national doubling rate of 93.89 days.

The state also sent 5901 swab samples to Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in Bhubaneshwar for RT PCR tests. These samples were collected from Khunti, Ranchi and Hazaribag.

Meanwhile, the state on Sunday administered the first dose of vaccine against Covid-19 to 80,515 people on the day, while the second dose was administered to 6453 beneficiaries. Jharkhand achieved 58 per cent of its target for the first dose and only 3 per cent for the second dose on the day. So far, over 20 lakh Jharkhand residents have received the first jab of the vaccine and 3 lakh of them have got the second dose as well.