Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala's Covid test positivity rate (TPR), which shot up as high as 30 per cent, has fallen to 17.87 per cent, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said on Thursday.
Addressing the media here, Pinarayi Vijayan, however, said that the cause of concern is that, even as the spread has come down, the death rate is high.
He told that experts suggest that this present rate is on account of the high number of cases reported in the past weeks.
Experts have now arrived in districts where the deaths are high.
He added that on Thursday, 24,166 people turned positive, while 30,539 were tested negative in the state.
At present, there are 2,41,966 active cases in the state, while the total number of recoveries reached 21,98,135. There were 181 deaths reported taking the death toll to 8,063.
Regarding the alarming spread of the black fungus, he said that the state has reported 52 cases so far.
"It has come to our notice, there is a fear factor in the people about this and we will be taking adequate steps to ease the concerns of the people," he said.
Across the state, there were 8,76,584 people under observation at various places which included 40,164 at hospitals.
Vijayan said it has come to notice that canards are being spread in the social media that those who take Covid vaccines "will die in two years".
"This is a heinous attempt and strict action will be taken against the perpetrators. All should realise that in the above 60 age category, those who took the vaccines, to a large extent, were saved in the second wave and those who turned positive had only a mild attack and it has been proved to keep Covid at bay, vaccination is the only way out," he added.
He said that those children who have lost both parents to Covid will be taken care of by the government.
"They will be given a one-time payment of Rs 3 lakh besides they will get Rs 2,000 per month till they turn 18 and the expense on their education till graduation will be taken up by the government," said Vijayan.