For the first time in almost a month, the Telangana government has revealed COVID-19 testing data in the state. As per the medical bulletin issued on Tuesday night, 44,431 samples have been tested in the state in total, of which 5,406 samples tested positive for the novel coronavirus.
The state’s positivity rate is at 12.17%, according to these figures -- alarming compared to the national positivity rate of roughly 5.8%.
The state has had a poor track record of transparency when it comes to sharing testing data. The low numbers of tests, combined with a relatively high positivity rate, had given rise to concerns.
The last time the state had revealed testing data was on May 17, nearly two weeks after it had stopped sharing information on test numbers on a regular basis. At the time, the state government had revealed that as of May 14, it had conducted 22,842 tests of which 1,388 or 6.1% of all tests returned positive.
The bulletin also shared data for Tuesday alone. A total of 1,251 samples were tested on June 16, of which 213 samples tested positive. This indicates a high positivity rate of 17% for the testing done on Tuesday.
A total of 213 new COVID-19 cases were reported in the state, of which 165 cases were from Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) limits.
With the steady increase in cases in Hyderabad, the state government on Sunday announced that 50,000 tests will be conducted over the next few days, in and around GHMC limits.
As per Tuesday’s bulletin, after GHMC, neighbouring Rangareddy district recorded the highest number of cases at 16. This was followed by Medak with 13 cases, and Karimnagar with 6 cases. Medchal registered 3 new cases, while Nizamabad and Sangareddy saw 2 cases each.
Jangaon, Kamareddy, Asifabad, Peddapalli, Siddipet and Yadadri Bhuvanagiri districts saw one new case each.
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