At least 48 corona patients, including 39 people getting treatment at hospitals, died on Saturday, as Pakistan’s current COVID-19 positivity ratio hits 3.96 percent, according to the National Command and Operation Centre’s (NCOC) update released on Sunday.
The highest positivity ratio was observed in Hyderabad at 11.57 percent, followed by Peshawar at 11.29 percent and Karachi at 10.68 percent, the NCOC revealed.
The positivity ratio in various federating units was observed as 5.97 percent in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK), 3.52 percent in Balochistan, 0.56 percent in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B), 1.18 percent in Islamabad, 5.25 percent in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), 2.54 percent in Punjab and 10.23 percent in Sindh.
As for the death toll, Pakistan’s COVID-19 death toll jumped to 11,295 on Saturday. At least 2,273 COVID-19 patients were currently said to be in a critical condition.
The NCOC’s detailed province-wise data revealed Lahore’s positivity ratio to be at 4.23 percent, Rawalpindi’s at 1.14 percent, 3.21 percent in Faisalabad, 1.91 percent in Multan and 4.46 percent for Bahawalpur in Punjab.
In Sindh, Karachi’s positivity ratio was recorded at 10.68 percent and 11.57 percent in Hyderabad.
As for KP, a positivity ratio of 11.29 percent was recorded in Peshawar, 3.41 percent in Swat and 0.31 percent in Abbottabad.
In Balochistan, Quetta’s positivity ratio was recorded at 2.41 percent. Meanwhile, the positivity ratio in AJK’s Mirpur stood at 5.04 percent and 2.50 percent in Muzaffarabad.
The case fatality rate (CFR) for Pakistan stood at 2.12 percent compared to the global 2.14 percent. Around 69 percent of patients who succumbed to the virus were males and 77.9 percent of all who died were over the age of 50.
Head of the NCOC, Federal Minister for Planning and Development Asad Umar, on January 12, referred to several countries witnessing a third wave of Covid-19 and appealed to Pakistanis to continue following standard operating procedures (SOPs) to contain the spread of the virus.
The federal minister maintained that the second wave of the virus had been worse in countries like the US and UK and warned others to continue acting responsibly.
Moreover, Asad Umar highlighted that the federal government had warned the public about the second wave of the virus in October.
“In November, we noticed a rapid increase in the number of cases and took steps at the end of November regarding sectors/activities that were responsible for the increase, including restaurants, marriage halls and educational institutions,” he added. It may be mentioned here that the national tally of total active COVID-19 cases in the country on Sunday reached 34,628 with 1,594 more people tested positive for the deadly virus and 1,981 people recovered from the disease during the last 24 hours. During the last 24 hours, most of the deaths had occurred in the Punjab followed by Sindh. It added that out of the total 48 deaths during last 24 hours 23 patients died on ventilators.
The maximum ventilators were occupied in four major areas including Multan 38 percent, Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) 35 percent, Bahawalpur 32 percent and Lahore 37 percent.
Also, 176 Sindh Police personnel tested positive for COVID-19 in the last four days, a spokesperson for the law enforcement agency said. After the detection of the new cases, the total number of policemen who have been affected by the virus so far has risen to 5,422.
The spokesperson added that 23 officials have so far succumbed to the disease, while 4,846 have recovered.
