Bengal on Sunday reported 6,980 Covid-19 cases, including 973 from Calcutta.

In 24 hours till 9am on Sunday, the state also logged 20,418 recoveries and 36 deaths, resulting in a drop in the total of active cases by 13,474, to 1,10,183.

This was a whole week — seven consecutive days — of such a drop in the third wave. Before January 17, the last drop in the total of active cases was registered on December 27 last year.

Thirteen of the state’s 23 districts reported zero deaths on Sunday. Calcutta reported 10.

The positive confirmation rate — the percentage of samples testing positive for the novel coronavirus — improved to 9.53 per cent (from 11.13 on Saturday), less than 10 for the first time in the third wave since December 31 last year.

On January 10, the positive confirmation rate had reached an all-time high of 37.32. In the 13 days since, it has improved by nearly 75 per cent.

Deemed a crucial indicator in the pandemic, the positive confirmation rate means less than one out of every 10 samples is testing positive currently. On January 10, it was two out of every five.

In a pandemic, a positive confirmation rate up to 5 per cent is considered tolerable. At the peak of the devastating second wave last year, the rate had climbed to 33 per cent.

The recovery rate, for the seventh consecutive day, also improved to reach 93.36 per cent — from 92.65 on Saturday — exceeding, after a while, the current national rate of 93.18.

Between December 29 and January 16, it had dropped by nearly eight percentage points, before recovering by about three percentage points in a week.

On December 28 — the last day of relatively normal numbers before the escalation of the third wave in Bengal — the statewide total was 752, including 382 from Calcutta, and the total active caseload was 7,457.

In the 26 days since, the state has logged over 3.33 lakh new infections, including more than 1.05 lakh from Calcutta. Bengal has more than 19.65 lakh cases now, since the first was detected in the state in March, 2020. The total includes over 18.34 lakh recoveries and 20,338 deaths.