Bengal home secretary Alapan Bandyopadhyay said seven more persons had died from Covid-19 in the past 24 hours and the state had 940 active positive cases as on Tuesday.

While 85 new cases were reported in the past 24 hours, the number of cured persons during the same period was 46. Bandyopadhyay said the recovery rate was 19.64 per cent.

The home secretary said there were a total of 1,344 confirmed cases of novel coronavirus infection in the state, while 264 were cured and released so far.

The seven deaths took the toll directly from Covid-19 to 68. There were 72 other deaths from comorbidities.

Of the 68 deaths, 40 were from Calcutta, 13 from Howrah and 10 from North 24-Parganas. Of the 940 active positive cases, 472 are from Calcutta, 225 from Howrah and 131 from North 24-Parganas.

“Across the country, there have been a lot more cases from metropolitan cities, especially in comparison to the rural areas, given the population density and various socio-economic reasons…. The reasons are so well discussed, so well deliberated, they are rather obvious,” said Bandyopadhyay.

Asked about the mortality rate of the state, which the inter-ministerial central team assigned to south Bengal alleged was the highest in the country, Bandyopadhyay said: “What is being hinted at, on social and mainstream media sometimes, that after testing positive, why are the number of deaths in Bengal on the higher side.” “If this is the point… more positive cases you test, lesser will be the mortality rate,” he added.

After the Centre approved 16 laboratories in Bengal for carrying out Covid-19 tests, the state ramped up testing and reached 306 tests per million on Tuesday. The figure was 109 per million 11 days ago.

“When the number of cases were less, when only the acute cases were being tested, then the mortality rate was appearing high,” the home secretary said. “Not because Bengal was particularly failing, but because the infrastructure was not present then.”

In the past 24 hours, the state had 2,455 tests, with the total rising to 27,571 tests. The percentage of positive cases out of samples tested now stands at 4.87 per cent.

Nurse tests positive

A 43-year-old nurse attached to Pavlov Institute, Calcutta, has been tested positive for Covid-19, two days after she fell ill while visiting home in Burdwan town on leave.

The nurse was immediately sent to a dedicated Covid-19 hospital in Durgapur.