Bengaluru, Domestic returnees and rising infections in contacts of earlier Covid cases in Karnataka made the state's tally touch the 7,000 mark with 176 new cases, an official said on Sunday.

"New cases reported from Saturday 5 p.m. to Sunday 5 p.m., 176," said a health official.

Like everyday, domestic returnees are the highest number of cases, 88, while 61 contacts of earlier cases also turned positive.

Among the domestic returnees, 82 or 93 per cent of the cases had travel history to Maharashtra.

There were also six cases with international travel history to the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and the Philippines.

Meanwhile, contacts of earlier cases turning positive are showing an upward trend with 61 such cases reported on Sunday.

Cases spiked in Bengaluru Urban, Yadgir, Udupi, Bidar, Kalaburagi, Dharwad, Ballari, Kolar, Uttara Kannada, Mandya and Daskhina Kannada.

Among the new cases, Bengaluru Urban contributed 42, followed by Yadgir (22), Udupi (21), Bidar (20), Kalaburagi (13), Dharwad (10), Ballari (8), Kolar (7), Uttara Kannada (6), Mandya and Dakshina Kannada (5 each), Bagalkote (4), Ramanagara (3), Raichur and Shivamogga (2 each) and Belagavi, Hassan, Vijayapura, Bengaluru Rural and Haveri (1 each).

Twelve patients are suffering from influenza like illness (ILI) and five from severe acute respiratory infection (SARI).

Meanwhile, five people succumbed to the virus, three from Bengaluru Urban, one from Dakshina Kannada and another from Bidar.

Among the new cases, 106 are males and 70 females, including 13 children below the age of 10 years.

Of the total cases, 2,956 patients have been discharged, 86 have died while 16 are admitted in the ICU. In the last 24 hours, 312 patients were cured and discharged.

On Sunday, the health department tested 7,451 samples out of which 6,835 turned negative.

In total, 4.43 lakh samples have been tested, of which 4.27 lakh have returned negative.

Currently, Yadgir is leading the state's Covid-19 burden with 536 active cases, followed by Kalaburagi (459), Bengaluru Urban (330) Udupi (312) and Raichur (292) among others.

Bengaluru Urban has accounted for 32 deaths, followed by Kalaburagi (10), Dakshina Kannada (7) and Bidar, Vijayapura, and Davangere (6 each) among others.