38 more perish as Sindh’s coronavirus death toll reaches 776, says CM Murad Ali Shah

As many as 38 people, including 16 women, lost their lives due to COVID-19 in the province during the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 776, deplored Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Thursday.

In his daily brief, he said, at least 30 people, including 13 women, died in Karachi alone. “It was another sad day when we lost 38 more people due to COVID-19 in the province in the last 24 hours. They include 16 women. At least 30 of these people, including 13 women, were from Karachi,” the CM said.

The CM deplored that the coronavirus spread had been at an alarming rate in the province as just in a day 3,038 new cases were detected. Enhancing the capacity of the labs, he said, 10,088 tests were conducted against which 3,038 new cases surfaced, constituting 30 per cent of the total tests.

“This is the highest number of tests conducted so far and the result is itself the highest since February 26 when the first case was diagnosed as positive,” he said, adding that the situation was going from bad to worse and “every one of us has to understand the severity of the situation”.

According to him, so far 256,705 tests have been conducted which produced 46,828 cases, constituting an overall 18 per cent positive results. He said 38 patients died overnight and now the number of patients died due to infection had reached 776 that constituted 1.6 per cent of the total patients.

The CM said that at present, 24,005 patients were under treatment, including 22,324 in different hospitals and 60 in isolation centres. He added that out of those 24,005 patients, 636 were in critical condition, whereas 79 patients had been on ventilators.

Quoting the figures, Murad said that out of 3,038 new cases, Karachi had produced the highest number of 2,145 cases, including 650 in South, 569 in East, 307 in Central, 284 in Malir, 201 in Korangi and 134 in West districts.

He said 88 cases were from Hyderabad, 77 from Larkana, 67 from Ghotki, 26 from Nawabshah, 23 each from Shikarpur and Jacobabad, 22 each from Jamshoro and Khairpur , 19 from Dadu, 13 from Badin, 11 from Sujawal, 10 from Matiari, eight from Thatta, seven each from Mirpurkhas and Naushehrofeoze, five from Tando Mohammad Khan, three from Tando Allahyar and one case from Kambar-Shahdadkot.

Murad said the experts, given the present spike in the cases, had predicted that the cases might exceed to 300,000, with 5,000 deaths by June 30, if SOPs were not followed properly. He urged the people of Sindh to be careful and save themselves and others from being infected.