The active cases tally on Tuesday dropped to 4,562 from 4,689 the previous day

Delhi recorded 442 fresh COVID-19 cases and 12 new fatalities on Tuesday, while the city’s positivity rate came down to 0.55 per cent, authorities said.

The infection tally in the city stood at over 6.27 lakh and the death toll mounted to 10,609, they said. The 442 new cases came out the 79,777 tests conducted the previous day, including 41,633 RT-PCR tests and 38,144 rapid antigen tests, according to the latest bulletin issued by the Delhi Health Department.

Delhi had recorded 384 cases on Monday, the lowest in over seven months, while the positivity rate stood at 0.76 per cent.

Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain had tweeted on Saturday that the positivity rate had been below one per cent for the past 11 days, and fresh cases were the lowest since May 17. From December 21-23, the daily cases count had been below the 1000-mark. The city reported 803 new cases on December 21; 939 on December 22 and 871 on December 23.

However, on December 24, 1,063 cases were recorded, dropping again to 758 on December 25 and 655 on December 26. The national capital reported 757 new cases on December 27 while on December 28, the daily cases count was 564, the lowest in the last five months.

On December 29 and 30, the city recorded 703 and 677 cases, respectively. A total of 574 fresh cases were recorded on December 31; 585 on January 1; 494 on January 2 and 424 on January 3.

The active cases tally on Tuesday dropped to 4,562 from 4,689 the previous day.

The Tuesday’s bulletin said the total number of cases has climbed to 6,27,698. According to it, out of total 13,954 beds in COVID hospitals, 12,184 are vacant. It said 154 beds in COVID care centres are occupied by people under quarantine, including travellers who have returned by Vande Bharat Mission and bubble flights.

The Delhi government had significantly ramped up testing in the past few weeks, with the count on several times crossing the 60,000-mark.

The number of tests done per million, as on Monday, was over 4.7 lakh while the total number of COVID-19 tests stood at over 90 lakh. The bulletin said 6,12,527 patients have recovered, been discharged or migrated so far.

The number of COVID-19 containment zones in Delhi dropped to 3,400 on Tuesday from 3,491 the previous day, authorities said. The number of people in home isolation dropped to 2,285 on Tuesday from 2,426 the previous day.

(Cover: People walk past an awareness mural on Covid-19 painted on a wall along the roadside in New Delhi on January 4, 2021 /Credit: Getty Images)