Over 1600 people, including 635 in Ranchi alone, tested positive for Covid-19 in 24 hours, taking the tally in Jharkhand close to 57,000, a bulletin released by the National Health Mission (NHM) on Wednesday late night stated.

The count of Covid fatalities in the state also crossed the 500 mark on Wednesday with nine patients dying during treatment, the bulletin highlighted. Out of the 512 Covid casualties reported in Jharkhand so far, at least 232 occurred in East Singhbhum, a district that reported six of state’s nine Covid deaths on Wednesday.

While East Singhbhum accounted for nearly half of state’s Covid fatalities, Ranchi alone has reported over 25 per cent of cases in Jharkhand. As per latest figures with the health department, Wednesday’s findings took the tally in Ranchi to 11,983, while the number of active cases here stood at 3,545.

The number of active cases of Covid infection in Jharkhand also drew close to 16,000 on Wednesday as only 1297 patients recovered while 1601 fresh cases were reported in 24 hours, the health department said in its bulletin. The recovery rate in Jharkhand, as per government data, was 71.46 per cent against the national average of 77.32 per cent. Of the 56,897 Covid people infected by the virus in Jharkhand so far, at least 40,659 have recovered, figures with the health department state.

Meanwhile, East Singhbhum reported 250 fresh cases of infection and only 31 recoveries, which took the number of active cases in the district to 3417. The district is only behind Ranchi in terms of active Covid cases. Interestingly, besides Ranchi and East Singhbhum, all other districts in the state reported a double-digit spike in Covid cases.

The government has so far collected swab samples of 12.80 lakh people and tested 12.69 lakh of them. Health workers on Wednesday tested swab samples of 20,437 people and 18,836 of them tested negative. The district administration in Ranchi ran a special Covid testing drive on Wednesday and tested swab samples of at least 3833 people as a part of the drive.

As per government data, as many as 15,726 people were battling the lethal virus in Jharkhand by Wednesday midnight, and several hundred of them were in home quarantine.