The COVID-19 infections in Odisha dipped by 20% on Thursday with 1,515 more cases reported than the previous day while the test positivity rate climbed down to 9.33% in the last 24 hours. Of the new infectees, 867 positives are from the 0-18 year age group.

As against yesterday’s 7,416 cases, the State on Thursday logged 5,901 fresh infections, signifying the steady decline of positive cases in the prevailing third wave of the disease.

The daily recoveries which again crossed 10,000-mark outnumbered the fresh cases while the test positivity rate decreased from below 11.38% to 9.33%in the State in the last 24 hours.

With the latest daily infection count, the cumulative tally has climbed to 12,31,169, while the State currently has 70,327 active cases. A total of 63,209 samples were tested in the state in the past 24 hours with a below-10% TPR.

A total of 11,52,239 patients have recovered from the disease so far, including 10,078 in the past 24 hours. The toll mounted to 8,550 with eight deaths recorded in different parts of the State. The State has so far registered 347 Omicron variants.

Khurda district, which includes the state capital Bhubaneswar, continues to be State’s Covid hotspot and reported the highest number of new cases at 1,430, followed by Sundargarh (545), Cuttack (402) and Balasore (300) cases.

All the 30 districts in the State currently have active cases while Khordha, Sundargarh, Cuttack and Balasore with over 2,500 active cases are placed in the red zone. 13 other districts with above 1,000 active cases are bracketed in the yellow zone category while the remaining 13 districts figure in the green zone with fewer than 1,000 active cases.

The State’s recovery rate currently stands at 93.58% while active cases account for 5.71% of total positive cases registered in the State.

The State’s share is 3.29% in the country’s confirmed virus caseload while the active cases are 4.25% of India’s total active cases. The number of cured patients accounts for 3.27% of the country’s total recovery. Odisha has so far reported 1.76% of the country’s Coronavirus deaths.

The state’s health authorities have so far administered 5,60,88,234 COVID-19 vaccine doses while 2,39,32,087 people out of 3.09 crore eligible adult population are fully vaccinated. A total of 3,77,278 have so far received booster or precaution doses so far. Over 77% of the eligible population has so far received both doses of vaccine.