Hyderabad, Feb 4 (IANS): Active Covid-19 cases in Telangana dropped below 2,000 as more patients continue to recover, state health officials said on Thursday.

A total of 198 patients recovered from the virus during the last 24 hours, bringing down the active cases to 1,985. Of them 776 were in home or institutional isolation.

According to director of public health and family welfare, the recovery rate improved to 98.78 per cenrt as against the national average of 97.1 per cent.

The state reported 177 new cases, pushing the tally to 2,95,101. The number of recoveries mounted to 2,91,510.

Two more persons succumbed to the virus, taking the toll to 1,606.

Fatality rate remained 0.54 per cent against the national average of 1.4 per cent. While 44.96 per cent of the deaths occurred due to Covid, 55.04 per cent had comorbidities.

During the last 24 hours, the state conducted 41,343 tests. While the government laboratories tested 37,288 samples, the remaining 4,055 tests were conducted in private laboratories.

The cumulative number of tests conducted in the state rose to 79,96,651. Tests per million population climbed to 2,14,848.

The daily count of cases in Greater Hyderabad was 30. Rangareddy district and Medchal Malkajgiri logged 11 cases each. Five districts recorded zero cases while the daily count in remaining 25 districts was in single digit.

According to the officials, 70 per cent of positive cases reported in the state so far were asymptomatic.

Over 91 per cent of the beds in hospitals treating Covid cases remained vacant. As many as 8,061 beds out of 8,577 beds in 62 government hospitals were vacant. Similarly, in 217 private hospitals 6,994 out of 7,687 beds were vacant.