Thiruvananthapuram, Jun 12 (IANS): For the first time in the last few weeks, the Covid test positivity rate (TPR) in Kerala fell to 12.72 per cent, but the death tally continues to be high, said Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan in a statement on Saturday.

Vijayan's statement said that 13,832 people turned Covid positive after 1,08,734 samples was tested in the past 24 hours, while there were 1,29,488 active cases across the state.

The TPR last month rose as high as 30 per cent following which Vijayan announced a statewide lockdown, which will be in force till Wednesday.

Saturday also saw 18,172 people turn negative taking the total recoveries to 25,75,769.

Among the 14 districts, Thiruvananthapuram on Saturday recorded the highest tally of 2,234 cases.

The day saw 171 Covid deaths taking the total death tally to 10,975.

Across the state there were 5,45,000 people under observation at various places which includes 31,103 at hospitals.

There were 880 hot spots in the state.

Saturday and Sunday are being observed as a triple lockdown with the police increasing their checking and those who are out without a valid reason are being fined and vehicles confiscated.

On the vaccination front, the Kerala IT Parks and Technopark Employees Cooperative (TEC) Hospital in collaboration with the IT companies on Saturday launched a Covid 19 vaccination drive for the state's IT professionals and their family members from more than 450 companies.

This will be extended to the entire IT workforce at the Infopark in Kochi and Cyberpark in Kozhikode in the coming weeks.