Hyderabad, Jul 12 (IANS): Telangana's Covid-19 tally crossed 33,000 with 1,178 more people testing positive on Saturday, officials said.

During the last 24 hours, the health authorities conducted 11,602 tests, the highest in a single day since the outbreak. With this, the cumulative number of tests rose to 1,62,171.

The number of daily tests doubled since Friday as authorities have started using Rapid Antigen Test (RAT) kits at 40 urban primary health care centres in parts of Greater Hyderabad and in neighbouring Rangareddy and Medchal districts.

The state also saw nine fresh fatalities on Saturday, pushing the death toll to 348.

The number of infections declined for the third day in a row and this is despite the number of tests being doubled.

The state had recorded 1,278 cases on Friday and 1,410 the previous day. Earlier, the daily jump had reached nearly 2,000.

More people were discharged than the number of positive cases in a single day. As many as 1,714 people were discharged, taking the cumulative number of recoveries to 20,919.

Officials said 12,135 patients were undergoing treatment either at hospitals or at home.

Of the new cases reported Saturday, Greater Hyderabad accounted for 736. Neighbouring districts of Rangareddy and Medchal accounted for 125 and 101 cases. The cases were reported from almost all districts in the state.

The medical bulletin continued to maintain that only 10.7 per cent of 17,081 Covid beds in government hospitals are occupied, and as many as 15, 250 beds are still available.