Hyderabad, Mar 18 (IANS): The surge in Telangana's daily Covid-19 count continued as the state reported 278 cases during the last 24 hours, the highest so far this year.

With some schools in different parts of the state emerging as the new hotspots during the last couple of days, the cumulative tally has mounted, sending health authorities into a tizzy.

The fresh cases pushed the tally to 3,02,047.

Adilabad and Nirmal districts bordering Maharashtra saw a surge in the new infections. Adilabad reported 28 and Nirmal 24 cases during the last 24 hours. The majority of them were students of the government-run residential schools.

Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) reported 35 cases, the highest in the state. Adilabad, Nirmal, Karimnagar, Mancherial, Nalgonda, Rangareddy and Sangareddy reported cases in double digits. In the remaining 25 districts the daily count was in single digit.

The sudden spurt in cases has worried the authorities who had already sounded an alert following surge in cases in neighbouring Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Three more persons succumbed to the virus during the last 24 hours, taking the cumulative death toll to 1,662. The fatality rate rose slightly to 0.55 per cent against the national average of 1.4 per cent.

While 44.96 per cent of deaths were due to Covid-19, remaining 55.04 died due to comorbidities.

The number of active cases rose further to 2,265 including 830 who are in home or institutional isolation. After a gap of more than one-and-half months, the active Covid-19 cases had crossed 2,000 on Tuesday.

A total of 111 people recovered from the virus during the last 24 hours, taking the cumulative recoveries to 2,98,120. The recovery rate dropped to 98.69 per cent but still above the national average of 96.4 per cent.

A total of 59,905 tests were conducted during the last 24 hours. Of these 54,358 samples were tested in government laboratories and remaining 5,547 in private laboratories.

With this the number of tests conducted in the state so far climbed to 94,19,677. Samples tested per million population rose to 2,53,081.

The bed status in 62 government hospitals treating Covid-19 shows that 7,992 out of 8,419 beds were vacant. Similarly, in 215 private hospitals 6,558 out of 7,567 beds were vacant.