527 COVID-19 cases in TN in a day: Koyambedu market cluster a major source

Tamil Nadu reported 527 COVID-19 cases on May 4, a major chunk of these are patients who are either working at Koyambedu wholesale market for perishable goods like vegetables, fruits, grains and flowers in Chennai or their contacts. With this, the state presently has 3,550 COVID-19 cases of which 2,107 are active cases.

Chennai still remains Tamil Nadu’s biggest hotspot and of the new cases reported on Monday, 266 are from the district. The second-highest number of cases on Monday has been reported from Cuddalore - 122 in all. The district presently has 161 COVID-19 cases and all new cases reported on Monday have been sourced to the Koyambedu market cluster in Chennai. People - especially farmers and vendors from other districts - travel to Koyambedu to sell their produce.

The Koyambedu market cluster has emerged as the biggest source of infection in the state currently. Health Authorities clamped down on one of the biggest perishable goods markets in the country only after two cases of infections emerged from the area. Following this, the Health Department began screening all those at the market just a few days ago.

The new cases reported from two other districts, Villupuram and Perambalur also trace their source to the Koyambedu market cluster. Villupuram reported 49 COVID-19 cases and Perambalur district reported 25 COVID-19 cases on Monday. Villupuram now has a total number of 135 COVID-19 patients and Perambalur has 36 patients.

The break-up of other new cases is as follows:  Thiruvannamalai - 11, Dindigul - 10,  Tenkasi and Thiruvallur - nine each, Ariyalur - six, Chengalpattu and Trichy - four each, Ranipet - three, Thiruvarur and Virudhunagar - two each, Karur, Madurai, Ramanathapuram, Thanjavur, and Tirupattur - one each.

Thirty COVID-19 patients who were undergoing treatment in different hospitals were discharged on Monday. With this, the ratio of active and recovered novel coronavirus cases in the state is 1 : 0.6 (i.e. 2,107:1,409).

Tamil Nadu amped up its testing facilities and currently has 50 testing centres across the state of which 36 are government labs. 1,62,970 samples have been tested so far of which 12,863 were tested in a single day on Sunday.

The state also reported one COVID-19 death on Monday. A 65-year-old man from Chennai admitted to Stanley Medical College Hospital died due to COVID-19 infection on May 4 at 12.45 AM. The patient had comorbidities. With this, the state has reported 31 COVID-19 deaths in total.

Chennai has reported 267 recoveries as on date but Coimbatore and Tiruppur districts top the chart with the most number of recoveries. While Coimbatore has reported 133 recoveries of the 146 COVID-19 cases, Tiruppur has had 109 recoveries of the 114 total cases.