Lahore/Quetta/Karachi/Peshawar (Staff Report/Agencies): The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Pakistan on Saturday rose to 39,729.
Overall, 14,201 cases were reported in Punjab, 15,590 in Sindh, 5,847 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 2,544 in Balochistan, 518 in Gilgit Baltistan, 921 in Islamabad, and 108 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK).
According to the National Command and Control Centre, the death toll related to COVID-19 has reached 866, while at least 10,880 patients have fully recovered.
The number of coronavirus cases has continued to soar despite the country remained under a lockdown nearly one and a half month.
Meanwhile, Pakistan conducted over 14,878 tests in the past 24 hours which is the highest number of assessments made to diagnose COVID-19 patients.
This was stated during meeting of National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) headed by Minister for Planning Development Reforms and Special Initiatives Asad Umar held in Islamabad on Saturday.
The participants of the meeting expressed satisfaction over enhancement of testing capacity that has witnessed 30 times increase. The country had two labs to test Covid-19 samples in mid-March and now has 70 laboratories.
Moreover, the Punjab government has allowed resumption of inter-city and inter-district transport services after a 20% reduction in fares.
Partial domestic flight operations were also restored in the country from five major airports on Saturday to facilitate the passengers.
On Friday, Prime Minister Imran Khan said that we will have to learn to live with the coronavirus this year as its cure is not forthcoming soon.
In his televised address to explain the situation regarding the Covid-19, the premier said that the country could not afford an indefinite lockdown as 150 million people have been affected by the lockdown enforced to contain the spread of the coronavirus in the country.
PM Khan said that the government is prepared to deal with an increase in the number of coronavirus cases and is working on increasing healthcare capacity.
While reiterating that the government was dealing with the crisis on the basis of consensus, the prime minister appealed to the provinces to reopen public transport.
Khan insisted that it was the common man that was suffering due to public transport being suspended.
However, Sindh govt refused to resume transport services as Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa announced reopening all public transport from Monday.
It is pertinent to mention here that the global coronavirus cases have reportedly surpassed 4.5 million and death toll tops 306,000.
