Bengal crossed 14 lakh Covid-19 tests with 34,358 tests being recorded in a 24-hour period till 9am on Wednesday.

The state also reported 3,169 new Covid-19 cases and 53 deaths, besides 2,973 recoveries during the same period.

It took 92 days for Bengal to reach the test tally of 14-lakh after logging the first lakh. The state reached the latest lakh in just three days. Bengal reported over 5.23 lakh tests in August so far, with the total test count at 14,16,556.

The state has a total of nearly 1.26 lakh cases now, of which around 96,000 are recoveries and 2,581 are deaths.

The recovery rate now is 75.97, which was 68.92 per cent even at the beginning of the month. The national rate right now is 73.79.

“We have not been able to reduce the rise in new cases yet, but we have been doing a great deal in recovery and testing,” said a minister.

“We are already at the 35,000 level in daily testing. We will go past 40,000 in a matter of days. Our aim is to get past 50,000 in the next few weeks,” he added.

Bengal’s tests per million has gone up from 9,927 at the beginning of August to 15,740.

Testing in Bengal began in early February and the state took over three-and-a-half months to get past 1 lakh, on May 19. “Even after considerable ramp-up, crossing the milestones between 2 lakh and 5 lakh took us 10-12 days each. Look at us now,” said the minister.

“We crossed 10 lakh (on August 5), 11 lakh (on August 9) and 12 lakh (on August 13) in four days each.

Now, we crossed 13 lakh (on August 16) and 14 lakh (on August 19) in just three days each,” he added.

Owing to the sharp spike in new cases, the positive confirmation rate is now 8.89 per cent, which was 7.86 even at the beginning of the month.

“Another 4.8 lakh tests are likely in what remains of August. If we get there, we will have conducted 10 lakh tests this month,” said the minister.

Of the 3,169 new cases reported on Wednesday, 666 were from the city, while 657 were from North 24-Parganas. However, since they also reported 605 and 627 recoveries, respectively, their total of active cases increased only marginally.

Of the total 2,581 deaths reported, Calcutta alone accounted for 1,121, with 11 till 9am. North 24-Parganas reported a total of 596 deaths, 16 of them on Wednesday.

The state government reported 2,277 (88.2 per cent) deaths as those with comorbidity “present”.
Bengal’s overall mortality rate improved to 2.04, but still lagged behind the national rate of 1.9 per cent.
Calcutta’s mortality rate fell to 3.28.

Of 11,825 beds earmarked for Covid-19 patients at 85 dedicated hospitals, 38.24 per cent are occupied.
Telemedicine consultation for the pandemic was provided to around 96,000, including 4,514 in the past 24 hours.