Islamabad, April 18 Pakistans Health Ministry on Saturday expressed concerns over the regular increase in the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases, which took the overall tally 7,481 with 143 deaths across the countr.
Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Health Zafar Mirza chaired a meeting of the Islamabad Healthcare Regulatory Authority on Saturday and said the regular increase in the COVID-19 cases, especially during the month of April, has raised concerns for the government, reports Xinhua news agency.
According to the data released by the Ministry, the country witnessed an increase of 5,442 positive cases during the first 17 days of April, which were 2,039 by the end of March.
Mirza said the government was working to improve its capacity to carry out coronavirus tests from 6,000 to 20,000 on a daily basis by the end of the current month as it had obtained one million diagnostic kits for the disease, according to the report.
The data showed that Pakistan has conducted at least 92,548 tests so far, and eight patients died and 465 persons tested positive during the last 24 hours across the country.
Punjab province continued to be the most affected region of the country with a total of 3,391 positive cases followed by Sindh province which has 2,217 confirmed cases.
At least 1,077 cases were registered in the northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 335 in Balochistan, 250 in the Gilgit-Baltistan region, and 163 in the capital Islamabad.
At least 50 people have died in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa followed by 47 deaths in Sindh and 37 causalities in Punjab.
Overall, 5,506 active patients are under treatment at different localities while 1,832 have been discharged after complete recovery, which is 24.5 per cent of the total cases.
( With inputs from IANS )