Thiruvananthapuram, Sep 17 (IANS): There is no respite from high daily Covid tallies for Kerala as on Friday, 23,260 people turned positive after 1,28,817 samples were sent for testing in the past 24 hours and the test positivity rate was 18.05 per cent, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said in a statement.

For the past several weeks, Kerala continues to head the tally of new cases in the country.

Vijayan, in the statement, also said that 20,388 people turned negative taking the active cases in the state to 1,88,926, of which 12.8 per cent of the patients are in hospitals.

The day saw 131 Covid deaths being reported, taking the toll to 23,296.

As on date, 81.9 per cent of the above 18 year population have received one dose of vaccine, while 33.4 per cent have got both the doses.

Even as the number of daily cases is in the range of around 20,000, the Education Department on Friday came out with a circular stating that all final year classes in educational institutions in colleges will begin from October 4 and the institutions have been asked to make suitable arrangements.