Bengal’s public health engineering minister Soumen Mahapatra on Sunday said he tested positive for Covid-19, a day the state logged yet another highest 24-hour spike in new infections, with 3,274.

The state also reported 3,048 recoveries and 57 deaths in the 24-hour window ending at 9am on Sunday. Eight persons succumbed in Calcutta and 18 in North 24-Parganas.

With this, Bengal went past 1.38 lakh infections since the onset of the pandemic, of which 1.08 lakh are recoveries and 2,794 are deaths.

Bengal also logged the most number of tests in a day, 37,149.

Minister Mahapatra in his statement in the afternoon said that as he was asymptomatic, he was in home isolation.

Mahapatra is the third minister in the Mamata Banerjee cabinet, after fire and emergency services minister Sujit Bose and minister of state for micro, small and medium enterprises Swapan Debnath, to test positive.

Around 20 sitting members of the Bengal Assembly have so far been infected.

The pandemic has also claimed the lives of CPM veteran and former transport minister Shyamal Chakraborty, Trinamul’s Egra MLA Samaresh Das and Falta MLA Tamonash Ghosh.

Of the total 2,794 deaths reported, Calcutta alone accounted for 1,174 deaths and North 24-Parganas for 647 so far since the onset of the pandemic. The state government reported 2,439 or 87.3 per cent as deaths with comorbidity “present”. In two weeks, there have been 735 deaths of Covid-19 infected people, of which 617 were comorbid, according to the government.

Bengal’s overall mortality rate is now 2.01, behind the national rate of 1.85 per cent. Calcutta’s mortality rate is 3.23. But a Bengal minister held out hope that the state should be able to lower mortality rate to below 2 this week.

Of the new infections, Calcutta reported 563 and North 24-Parganas 696. But Calcutta also logged 575 recoveries while North 24-Parganas reported 575.

“It can be safely said now that a turnaround is discernible in these two high-incidence districts. In two weeks, the total active cases in Calcutta fell from 7,041 to 5,890. In the same period, total active cases of North 24-Parganas rose only (marginally) to 5,796 from 5,774,” the minister said.

The share of total active cases in the two districts fell in two weeks from 48.58 per cent to 41.63 per cent. The recovery rate of these two districts put together went up from 70.58 per cent to 79.4 in that time.

Bengal’s recovery rate is now 77.78 per cent — an improvement by over 7.5 in two weeks — while the national rate is 75.1.

With the new high in testing, total tests went past 15.61 lakh, at 17,348 per million people. “In August, so far, we have conducted 6.68 lakh tests. We are looking to cross 10 lakh in the month,” the minister said.

Because of the sharp spike in new cases, positive confirmation rate is now 8.89 per cent. It was 7.86 even at the start of the month.

The state reported 36.51 per cent occupancy in the 12,035 beds earmarked for Covid-19 in the 87 dedicated hospitals for the pandemic.

Telemedicine consultation for the pandemic was provided to 1.14 lakh, including 4,511 in the past 24 hours.