Covid-19 positivity rate spikes to 22.4pc as 1,609 test positive

Kenya’s Covid-19 positivity rate has spiked to 22.4 per cent after 1,609 out of 7,176 samples tested in the last 24 hours returned positive results.

That’s more than 6 per cent increase from Thursday’s positivity rate, which stood at 16.3 per cent after 943 out of 5,787 samples that were tested confirmed positive results.

Out of the 1,609 new Covid-19 cases, 1,512 were confirmed among Kenyan nationals, while 97 were confirmed among foreigners.

Eight hundred and seventy-seven (877) of the new cases were among female patients, while 732 were among male patients.

The youngest new patient is a one-year-old child, while the oldest is aged 84.

Kenya’s total caseload now stands at 260,166, with the total number of tests conducted now standing at 2,915,257.

With 853 new cases, Nairobi led in the number of new infections, followed by Kiambu (158), Nakuru (113), Kericho (97), Mombasa (54), Kajiado (33), Kitui (32) and Kisumu (29).

Other counties, which recorded between 20 and 29 cases, were Machakos, Murang’a, Uasin Gishu, and Kwale.

Persons aged between 30 and 39 had the highest number of new infections, with 536 cases recorded. The 20-29 years’ age bracket followed with 509 cases. Others are 40-49 years (289), 50-59 years (142), 10-19 years (71), 60 years and above (47), and 0-9 years (15).

Thirty-eight (38) more patients recovered from Covid-19, pushing the total number of recoveries to 249,192.

Three more patients died in the last 24 hours, raising the death toll to 5,353.

Kenya has thus far vaccinated 8.67 million people against Covid-19. Out of these, 5.18 million are partially vaccinated, while 3.48 million are fully inoculated.

The Government targets to vaccinate 27.2 million people.