Islamabad: The countrywide lockdown during the Eid holidays is yielding results and the numbers of daily deaths as well as new cases of COVID-19 are on the decline in the country.
According to the latest data of the National Command & Operation Centre (NCOC), Pakistan reported 48 deaths and 2,517 new cases of COVID-19 in the last twenty-four hours.
With these latest figures, the country’s total number of cases have jumped to 873,220 while the death toll stands at 19,384.
According to the NCOC, after 30,700 tests in the last twenty-four hours the country’s positivity rate was 8.19 per cent while the number of active cases had also dropped to 73,398 from 75,000 a day earlier.
According to the Ministry of the National Health Services, 1.966 million people in Pakistan have been ‘partially’ vaccinated so far while 964,227 persons have been ‘fully’ vaccinated.
The health ministry’s portal further shows that the country has used 3.836 million doses of vaccine and according to the District Health Officer (DHO) of Islamabad a mass vaccination drive will launch from Monday, May 17 administering almost 100,000 persons in the federal capital.
Vaccine jabs
Punjab has already set a target of administering vaccine jabs to 300,000 persons daily. Similarly, Sindh has also expedited vaccination drive keeping its vaccination centres open and operational even during the two Eid holidays, Thursday and Friday.
Federal Minister for Planning, Development & Special Initiative Asad Umar in a tweet held that Pakistan had performed better than the most countries in minimizing deaths due to COVID-19 while keeping the economy going in the last year.
It was a period of the worst threat to stability nations faced around the world, in the last 100 years, said he in his tweet.
In view of the coronavirus situation in the province, the Punjab government has decided to keep its schools, both the government-run and the private, closed till May 23.
Punjab Education Minister Murad Raas in a tweet said a review meeting would be held on May 18 to decide whether to open schools from May 24 or extend the closure period.
The education minister, meanwhile, urged the public to make sure they follow the standard operating procedures set by the government.
