Bengal on Tuesday logged 1,166 Covid-19 recoveries, 812 new infections and a toll of 24, including four from Calcutta, leading to a drop in total active cases for the 71st consecutive day since Vijaya Dashami on October 26.

The total active cases is 9,293 now, having improved by over 75 per cent from 37,190 on October 26.

With 4.09 per cent of the country’s active cases, Bengal is now sixth among states with the most active cases. That’s an improvement from a month ago when Bengal had 7 per cent of active cases and ranked third among states with the most active cases.

“We are looking to drop out of the top 10, within this month. We will be very well placed by the time the vaccination process takes off,” said a minister.

Bengal’s Covid-19 recovery rate has risen for 75 consecutive days, by over 9 per cent, to 96.56. The national rate is now 96.32 per cent.

Calcutta High Court had intervened with directives to prevent crowding and a worsening of the pandemic over Durga Puja, Kali Puja, Diwali and Chhath, the fewer number of infections during and after the festivities proving the instructions were effective. Before New Year, the court gave a similar set of instructions to ensure the outbreak did not worsen over revelries.

Since Dashami, the state reported over 2.27 lakh recoveries, outweighing the 2.02 lakh new infections detected.

The state’s Covid-19 total of 5.56 lakh cases includes over 5.37 lakh recoveries and 9,841 deaths. Bengal’s mortality rate is now 1.76, behind the 1.44 per cent nationally.

The state government attributed 8,254 (83.9 per cent) deaths of the total toll to comorbidities.

The state’s positive confirmation rate is 7.66 per cent now, having improved steadily from the 8.27 of November 20. The state’s total test count went past 72.66 lakh, at 80,734 tests per million people.