This can be considered an official declaration that the COVID-19 threat has blown over in Kerala. On Monday, after providing daily figures without fail for over two years from January 30, 2020, the Health Department has officially announced that it has stopped publishing the daily COVID-19 numbers.

When the figures were last published, on April 10, 223 new cases were reported and the test positivity rate had fallen to near 2%. The fall in cases had been swift and dramatic. The highest ever COVID cases in a day was reported just three months ago in January, 55,475 cases on January 25. During the second wave, the highest was 43,529 cases recorded on May 12, 2021. The TPR in January was hovering over the 40% mark.

There had been no COVID-related deaths since April 1. However, in the last few days, deaths that had happened earlier but were not recorded as COVID deaths were officially acknowledged as COVID deaths on the basis of the new COVID death reporting guidelines issued by the Centre. On April 10, five such deaths were added to Kerala's death tally, taking the total number of COVID deaths in Kerala to 68,365.

Testing had also dwindled. From a high of 1.2 lakh tests in January this year, it fell to 10,673 tests on April 10.

Though daily figures were provided to the media, the Health Department had stopped updating the COVID daily bulletin on its website from April 5.

Though there are constant warnings about new COVID variants, the Centre has assured that these were not causing any spike in cases. Falling case numbers, virtually zero fatalities and the lowered threat perception have together prompted the Health Department to eject out of the panic mode.