MANGALURU: Dakshina Kannada district has seen its positivity rate falling below 5%, while completing one million tests.
After launching a ring-surveillance drive a fortnight ago, the district conducted a record number of 1,11,587 tests in 14 days, and recorded an average positivity rate of 7.5%.
The district has so far recorded an overall positivity rate of 9.1% by reporting 91,036 positive cases after conducting 10,03,682 tests as on Friday, since March last year.
The positivity rate had crossed 20% in May, but thereafter the district started showing a decline in the graph.
On Friday, while the district tested 8,374 samples, the positivity rate remained at 4.5% with only 377 positive cases.
The district has declared more than 65 containment zones, where more than five positive cases were detected in one area, in the past one week.
Officials say that the ring-surveillance method with targeted testing adopted by the district, has yielded expected results.
District surveillance officer Dr Jagadeesh told STOI that the positivity rate in the district saw a reduction, even when the number of tests was increased.
“We have been conducting targeted tests in areas where positive cases are reported.
We do not conduct tests unnecessarily.
Through the targeted tests, we identify areas and check the spread of the virus by declaring containment zones.
Though we have increased the number of tests, results did not show an increase in the number of positive cases.
The positivity rate in the district has seen a drastic decline in the past fortnight,” he said.