23 more die from Covid-19 in Punjab: Nine-month-high number of Covid-19 cases in Rwp, Isb

LAHORE: Around 23 patients died from COVID-19 while 1,868 new infections were confirmed in Punjab province during the last 24 hours. Whereas the highest number of cases in a day in last 9 months was recorded in Rawalpindi and Islamabad where 735 patients tested positive for the pandemic, while 11 people died.

According to report issued by Primary and Secondary Healthcare (P&SH) Department Punjab on Friday, the death toll reached 5,917, while confirmed cases became 193,054 in the province. As per the spokesperson for Corona Monitoring Room at P&SHD, 15,818 tests were conducted in the last 24 hours, which raised the total number of tests to 3,598,893 in the province. Around 297 patients recovered during the last 24 hours which raised the number of total recovered individuals to 174,566 in the province.

Meanwhile, the spokesperson said that coronavirus vaccine second dose would be administered to healthcare workers at Expo Centre and in this regard, special arrangements had been made. The spokesperson added that the healthcare workers would now be registered with ordinary citizens according to their age.

Across the province, 107,793 healthcare workers have been given the first dose of the vaccine while 34,621 have been given the second dose. So far 523,008 people have been registered for coronavirus vaccination while vaccination confirmation message had been sent to 291,511 people.

The spokesperson further said that 217,637 coronavirus vaccines had been administered across Punjab while 75,223 people above the age of 60 had been vaccinated across the province. The spokesperson also said that best arrangements had been made for special persons and the very elderly while separate registration desks had also been set up for them.

Muhammad Qasim adds from Rawalpindi: For the first time after June 14 last year, over 730 patients have been tested positive for coronavirus illness, COVID-19 in a single day from Islamabad Capital Territory and Rawalpindi district setting a new record for the third-highest number of patients confirmed positive in a day from the region since the outbreak hit Pakistan while at least 11 confirmed patients belonging to the twin cities have lost their lives taking the death toll to 1,219.

Data collected by ‘The News’ on Friday reveals that the virus claimed five more lives from the federal capital in the last 24 hours taking the death toll from ICT to 536 while six more patients belonging to Rawalpindi district died of the disease taking the death toll from the district to 683.

In the last 24 hours, another 620 patients have been tested positive for COVID-19 from ICT taking the total number of confirmed patients from the federal capital to 50,096, of which 44,976 patients have so far recovered. On Friday, there were 4,584 active cases of coronavirus illness from ICT.

On the other hand, as many as 115 new patients have been tested positive for COVID-19 from Rawalpindi district in the last 24 hours taking the tally to 14,401 of which a total of 12,706 patients have achieved a cure.