Bengal on Wednesday reported 2,723 new Covid-19 infections, including 324 from Calcutta. In 24 hours till 9am on Wednesday, the state also logged 2,950 recoveries and 35 deaths — including seven from Calcutta — resulting in a dip in active cases by 262 to 21,880.

This was 17 consecutive days of such a drop in the third wave. Prior to this turnaround, the total active caseload had gone up nearly 22 times from the 7,457 of December 28 last year to 1.6 lakh on January 16. The state’s positive confirmation rate — the percentage of samples testing positive — was 4.61 per cent on Wednesday, the second consecutive day in the third wave when it was below 5 per cent.

Bengal’s recovery rate improved for the 17th consecutive day to reach 97.87 per cent. The national rate is 94.91. Between December 29 and January 16, it had dropped by nearly eight percentage points, before recovering by over seven percentage points in these 17 days.

Thirteen of the state’s 23 districts reported zero deaths. The mortality rate is 1.03 per cent. In these 17 days, the state reported 2.4 lakh recoveries, which outweighed the 1.02 lakh new infections detected.

Bengal has over 20 lakh cases now, since the first was detected in the state in March, 2020. The total includes more than 19.57 lakh recoveries and 20,687 deaths.