With 1,217 new COVID19 cases reported in J&K on Saturday, the total number of cases has gone up to 71,049.
As per the official records the tests per million and cases per million in J&K are higher than the national average even as the total number of tests carried out in the Union territory has crossed 15 lakh mark.
The official information reveeled that 15,39,284 samples have been tested for COVID19 till date, implying that one out of 81 people are getting tested or 123,142 tests per million.
A health official said the performance of J&K was among the top states and UTs in terms of the quantum of testing. The tests per million average in India is nearly 50,000 as per Union Health Ministry.
The testing pace in J&K has increased substantially over the past weeks with the increase in the number of Rapid Antigen Tests (RAT).
The official said over 20,000 RAT are done a day across districts in Jammu and Kashmir. He said although RT-PCR was also being used for testing samples, the random sampling, which forms the bulk of testing currently, was being done through RAT kits.
J&K has 5683 cases per million, higher than the national average of 4278 as per the Union Health Ministry data. The ministry today said 17 states and UTs have cases per million lower than the national average. Over the past three weeks, since the beginning of September, the number of cases in J&K has increased drastically.
The increase in cases, as per the government data, was majorly due to the rapid increase in the number of cases being reported for Jammu.
Financial Commissioner Health and Medical Education, Atal Dulloo attributed the rise in the number of cases as corresponding to the increase in the number of tests. “In Jammu, we have increased the testing to a great deal,” he said.
Today, of the 1217 cases reported, 720 were from Jammu, while 497 were from Kashmir. In Kashmir, the highest number of cases was reported from Srinagar where 180 people were found positive for COVID19. Srinagar now has reported 14,204 total cases, of which 2158 are active positive.
The number of cases from other districts is Budgam (47), Baramulla (46), Pulwama (58), Anantnag (28), Bandipora (19), Kupwara (73), Ganderbal (26), Kulham (15) and Shopian (5).
In Jammu, a new record high, 301 cases were reported from district Jammu alone. As per the data 1,937 patients recovered from the viral infection today, the total recoveries crossing 50,000 mark and reaching 51494.