Bhubaneswar: Odisha is witnessing an alarming rate of growth in COVID-19 cases in the second wave of the pandemic with nearly 50,000 persons in the state contracting the virus in last three weeks. As per official data shared by Information and Public Relation (I & PR) Department, total 47,463 people have so far tested positive for the deadly virus since April 1. Besides, 44 patients have succumbed to the virus in the last 21 days. The data reveals that the single-day tally has almost doubled in last one week. While 3108 cases were reported on April 15, the daily tally today crossed 6000-mark and stood at 6164, highest since virus outbroke in the state. Khordha district registered the highest ever spike of 1132 cases today. With the fresh cases, the state’s total caseload surged to 3,88,479 including 35,075 active cases. Keeping in view the rapid spread of the infection, the Government has increased the number of testing in the state over the last few days. In the last five days, the state conducted 1,84,505 tests, including 42,983 only April 21 (yesterday). In the first wave of the pandemic, districts like Ganjam, Khordha, Jajpur and Sundargarh were declared as COVID hotspot districts. In the second wave, as many as 13 districts–10 neighbouring Chhattisgarh and Khordha, Puri and Cuttack- have come under Red Zone.