Odisha: 146 new COVID-19 cases; tally crosses 4,000

Odisha's COVID-19 tally on Monday crossed the 4,000-mark, with 146 more people, including nine disaster response personnel, testing positive for the infection, a Health Department official said.

With these fresh patients, the total number of COVID-19 cases in the state rose to 4,055, he said.

Of the 146 cases, 128 were detected in various quarantine centres where people returning from different states are staying, while 18 were found in contact-tracing exercises, the official said.

"The new cases included nine disaster response personnel of the state fire service, who were engaged in the post-cyclone-Amphan restoration works in West Bengal and had returned from there," he said.

With this, the total number of disaster response men getting infected with the disease has increased to 158.

Odisha has now 1,333 active cases, while 2,708 people have recovered from the disease.

Eleven people have succumbed to the disease, while three other COVID-19 patients have also died in the state, but their deaths were attributed to other reasons. The new cases were reported from 15 districts.

Kandhamal reported the highest of 48 fresh cases, followed by 19 each from Bhadrak and Cuttack and eight each from Balasore and Ganjam.

Seven cases were detected in Khurda, six in Angul, five in Rayagada, four each in Jagatsinghpur, Nayagarh and Sundergarh, two in Sonepur and one each from Jharsuguda, Sambalpur and Dhenkanal.

The state health department conducted 2,499 tests on Sunday, while over 2.25 lakh samples have been tested in the state so far, the official added.