By Bizodisha Bureau, July 18, 2020: With three more deaths due to Covid-19, the death tally in Odisha rose to 86. The total Covid-19 tally rose to 16,701 with 591 fresh cases, a Health Department official tweet said on Saturday.

Two men from Ganjam, aged 63 and 60, and a 48-year-old woman from Gajapati died of coronavirus infection.

“Regret to inform the demise of three Covid positive patients while under treatment in hospitals,” the official said.

The woman was also suffering from obesity and sleep apnea, he said.

Of the total Covid-19 fatalities, 52 were reported from Ganjam, followed by Khurda (13), Cuttack (8) and Gajapati (3), while two each were from Angul and Puri, and one each from Baragah, Bhadrak, Jajpur, Kendrapara, Rayagada and Sundergarh districts.

Besides, twenty-six patients have died in Odisha, but their deaths were due to “non-Covid reasons”, the official said.

The new 591 cases were reported from 25 districts.

Of the fresh cases, 394 were detected in different quarantine centres and 197 during contact-tracing exercises, the official said.

Contact tracing and follow-up actions are underway, he said.

The maximum of 182 fresh cases were reported from Ganjam, the worst-hit district by the coronavirus pandemic, 121 from Khurda, 38 from Cuttack, 35 from Bargarh, 22 each from Jagatsinghpur, Nabarangpur and Mayurbhanj, 20 from Sambalpur, 19 from Jajpur, 18 from Sundergarh, 13 from Balasore and 11 from Nayagarh.

With another 608 COVID-19 patients recovering on Saturday, the tally of recovered patients go up to 11,938 according to a health department tweet.