Maharashtra’s active tally drops as recoveries surpass new cases
The Hindu
Fewer samples tested compared to daily average; 27 more succumb to COVID-19
After witnessing a case surge in the last few days, Maharashtra rallied again on Monday as recoveries outweighed cases with the State recording 3,233 patient discharges against 2,740 new COVID-19 infections. The active case tally has dipped to 49,880. However, the drop must be viewed in the context of a declining sample testing rate, with a little over one lakh samples being tested in the last 24 hours against the daily average of two lakh.![](/newspic/picid-1269750-20250217064624.jpg)
When fed into Latin, pusilla comes out denoting “very small”. The Baillon’s crake can be missed in the field, when it is at a distance, as the magnification of the human eye is woefully short of what it takes to pick up this tiny creature. The other factor is the Baillon’s crake’s predisposition to present less of itself: it moves about furtively and slides into the reeds at the slightest suspicion of being noticed. But if you are keen on observing the Baillon’s crake or the ruddy breasted crake in the field, in Chennai, this would be the best time to put in efforts towards that end. These birds live amidst reeds, the bulrushes, which are likely to lose their density now as they would shrivel and go brown, leaving wide gaps, thereby reducing the cover for these tiddly birds to stay inscrutable.