In one of the crucial developments in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, the official data of the Greater Chennai Corporation has revealed that the number of people, who carry the symptoms of Influenza-like lllness (ILI), testing positive for the virus has increased in the last one week as one in three patients who carry the ILI symptoms have spelled positive in the city. 

The revelation has come as the sequel of the fever camps installed and conducted by the civic body across the city to check and carry out testings for the patients. According to the corporation, the civic body has identified 40,175 ILI cases and it has collected swabs from 35,937 cases from May 8 to July 6. The number of swab samples collected across the city stood at 32,861 till July 4.

Of these 32,861 samples taken from the people who have shown the ILI symptoms like fever, cold, sore throat, and cough, 10,463 samples were tested positive till July 4 through which it came to the record that at least one in three patients with ILI tested positive for the virus in the city as the swab positivity rate stood at 31.84% amid the containment measures.

According to the corporation's data, these 10,463 cases have been identified through the fever camps where most of the residents give their samples for testing. Most of the positive cases have complained about fever or sore throat for two to four days while some cases have developed the symptoms of loss of smell and taste for two days and a drop at the oxygen saturation level. 
 
The reports say that the zones like Madhavaram, Alandur, Manali, and Perungudi have a major share in the percentage of the ILI patients testing positive for the virus in the city. These zones aren't been recorded as the COVID-19 hotspots in the city unlike how the zones of Tondiarpet, Royapuram, Kodambakkam, Teynampet, and Anna Nagar are getting treated as the hotspots. 

The civic body has attributed the current trend to the presence of fever camps and aggressive testing. The fever camps have been testing thousands of people in the city each day and testing has been paced up for the past one week. Rather than going to private hospitals, most of the residents are getting tested in the fever camps. 

According to the corporation, it has conducted 500 fever camps in the city on Monday and as of Tuesday, it has conducted 13,212 fever camps through which it has collected the samples of the symptomatic and asymptomatic people to detect the cases at the early stage. On Tuesday, Chennai has reported 1,203 cases- lowest in the week as the cases drop in the city amid the lockdown. 

As of Tuesday, Tamil Nadu has reported 1,18,594 cases so far of which 45,839 are active, 71,116 have been recovered, and 1,636 had succumbed to the virus.