Twin cities log eight deaths during Eid, 532 test positive

Rawalpindi: As many as eight deaths have been reported from the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi due to coronavirus illness, COVID-19 on Eid days, from Wednesday to Friday while 532 new patients have been tested positive for the illness taking tally from the region to 111,239.

It is important to mention here that on the first Eid after the advent of coronavirus in Pakistan, on Eidul Fitr last year from May 24 to May 26, as many as 10 patients died of COVID-19 from Islamabad Capital Territory and Rawalpindi district while around 550 patients were confirmed positive for the illness and later in June 2020, the population in the region faced one of the most severe phases of the outbreak with as many as 13, 264 cases and 252 deaths in a month.

Alarmingly, the positivity rate of COVID-19 in Rawalpindi district has jumped to 11.29 per cent in the last 24 hours while on Eid days, it was recorded as over eight per cent in the federal capital hinting that the fourth wave of the outbreak is getting more and more severe at least in this region of the country.

In the last three days, as many as 388 new patients were reported from ICT while from Rawalpindi district, a total of 144 patients were diagnosed with the infection though out of eight deaths reported due to COVID-19 from the region on Eid days, six were reported from Rawalpindi district.

Data collected by ‘The News’ on Friday reveals that to date, a total of 26,009 patients have been tested positive for COVID-19 from Rawalpindi district of which 24,299 have already achieved cure while 1,013 have died of the illness.

On Friday, 53 confirmed patients of coronavirus illness were undergoing treatment at the healthcare facilities in the district while some 644 confirmed patients were in home isolation.

Meanwhile, the death of two more patients from ICT in the last three days took death toll from the federal capital to 789 and confirmation of 388 more patients positive for COVID-19 took the tally to 85,230 from the federal capital. To date, 82,176 patients have recovered from the disease in the federal capital while on Friday, a total of 2,265 active cases of COVID-19 were there in ICT.