CM Murad Ali Shah worried as eight more die of COVID-19, over 400 new cases emerge in single day

With 404 new COVID-19 cases diagnosed, Sindh recorded the most number of new daily coronavirus cases on Wednesday. A total of eight persons also succumbed to the contagious disease between Tuesday and Wednesday

This was disclosed by Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah in his routine video message.

“Eight more persons, including two women, have died due to COVID-19 in the province. Of them, six people, who were of 55, 65, 68, 70, 71 and 74 years old, were from Karachi while one person each died in Larkana and Ghotki districts,” the CM said. Shah added that it was for the first time that 404 new cases of coronavirus were diagnosed and eight patients died bringing the death toll to three digits, 100.

“This is a very serious situation because we are detecting more cases and taking more bodies. Though the 20.5 per cent recovery ratio is encouraging, we have to save the lives of our people,” he remarked

The CM said 404 new cases emerged after a total of 3,729 tests were conducted. “This is quite worrisome that out of 404 cases, 332 belong to Karachi,” he said and added that “Karachi is on the increase in terms of new cases and deaths of the patients.”

According to Shah, the government has so far conducted 51,790 tests against which the number of cases detected have been 5,695. “The 404 new cases constitute 10.8 percent of 3729 tests conducted during the last 24 hours,” he said.

The CM informed the people that a total of 4,426 patients of the novel coronavirus were under treatment, including 3,187 or 72 per cent in home Isolation, 762 or 17 per cent at the isolation centres, and 477 or 11 per cent at different hospitals. “Our 54 patients are in a critical state, of them 18 are on a ventilator,” he disclosed.

He added that 208 patients had recovered from the coronavirus infection and returned to their homes. The overall recovery rate stood at 20.5 per cent as 1,169 patients had so far recovered from the viral disease.

In the Karachi division, the CM said 337 new cases had been reported. Sharing the district-wise details, he said District South had 113 new cases, District East 100, District Central 39, District Korangi 37, District West 26 and District Malir had 17 new cases.

“I want to request the people of Karachi to adopt precautionary measures, including wearing masks, keeping at a distance from children and elderly people and avoid going out of home unnecessarily; otherwise results would be horrible.”

Sharing the data of other district of Sindh, the CM said 14 people had tested positive for COVID-19 in Sukkur, 13 each in Khairpur and Larkana, and seven each in Shaheed Benazirabad and Shikarpur districts.

He expressed concern over the local spread of the virus in rural areas which spoke loud of the failure of the people to observe WHO and experts guidelines. “We will not be able to defeat the novel coronavirus unless our people cooperate,” he said.

Flights to Karachi

The CM said two flights from Kuala Lumpur and Abu Dhabi had brought back 505 stranded Pakistanis to Karachi. “They all were tested, as a result, 69 of them tested positive and the results of 39 results are yet to come,” he revealed.

He added that out of 69 COVID-19 positive cases among those coming to Pakistan from abroad, 22 belonged to Kyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 21 were from Sindh, 19 resided in Punjab, five were from Balochistan and two were from Azad Kashmir.

Shah said the testing capacity of laboratories operating in Sindh was also being enhanced and the establishment of a new lab in Larkana was under way.

Regarding the permission for businesses to operate, he said some industrial units and online businesses had been allowed to carry out operations but they would have to follow the SOPs. “We have to secure ourselves and others also,” he said.