By Ajmal Khan Yousafzai
ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Planning and Development Asad Umar on Wednesday warned of imposing tougher restrictions if violations of coronavirus standard operating procedure (SOPs) continues amid the second Covid-19 wave.
Speaking to the media after a meeting of the NCOC, Planning and Development Minister Asad Umar warned Covid-19 cases will go up if health guidelines are not adhered to, piling pressure on hospitals.
He said Prime Minister Imran Khan will preside over a meeting of the National Coordination Committee (NCC), to be attended by the chief ministers of all the provinces, to take stock of the present coronavirus situation.
Pakistan successfully overcame the first wave of the pandemic and the country can overcome the second wave by adhering to the Covid SOPs, said Umar, adding that National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) has witnessed 60 deaths per day on average and a 4 percent increase in corona patients during the last two months. The federal minister regretted that people are not following coronavirus SOPs as they did during the first wave. He said the PTI government will soon announce a relief package for the sectors closed in the second wave of the pandemic.
He once again appealed to the masses to strictly follow the standard operating procedures (SOPs) to contain the spread of the second of COVID-19.
The National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) said on Wednesday the countrywide positivity ratio of Covid-19 cases was recorded at 7.78 per cent in the past 24 hours.
Karachi recorded the highest positivity ratio at 21.80pc for a second day in row, followed by Hyderabad 19.3pc, Azad Jammu and Kashmir’s Mirpur 13.16pc, Rawalpindi 13.03pc, Peshawar 13.2pc, Abbottabad 11.82pc, Islamabad 6.28pc, Muzaffarabad 5.45pc, Quetta 4.15pc, Swat 4.23pc, Faisalabad 3.15pc, and Multan 2.1pc.
Sindh recorded the highest Covid-19 positivity ratio which was 13.01pc, followed by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 10.6pc, Azad Jammu and Kashmir 9.8pc, Balochistan 6.05, and Gilgit Baltistan 3.07pc. 2,498 of the total Covid-19 patients under treatment across the country are said to be in critical condition.
NCOC said on Wednesday that Pakistan had recorded 60 deaths and 2,963 new cases due to the COVID-19 in the last 24 hours.
In the past 24 hours, 60 more people succumbed to the disease, taking the death toll to 8,547. 1,797 patients have recovered from the virus during the last 24 hours and 2,498 patients are in critical condition including 12 more declared critical.
The total count of active cases is 45,324 and the positivity rate was recorded up to 7.78 per cent.
According to the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC), with fresh inclusion of the infections in the country the national tally of cases now currently stands at 426,142.
A total of 38,092 tests were conducted across the country during this period. Overall 372,271 people have recovered from the deadly disease so far while 5,865,944 samples have been tested thus far.
The national dashboard stated that the highest death toll was recorded in Punjab province during the last 24 hours. 39 out of 60 deceased patients were put on ventilators, whereas, the number of critical patients is consistently increasing in parts of the country.
