Lahore/Quetta/Karachi/Peshawar (Staff Report/Agencies): The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Pakistan on Wednesday rose to 154,760 after 5,839 new infections were reported over the past 24 hours.
Overall, 58,239 cases were reported in Punjab, 57,868 in Sindh, 19,107 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 8,437 in Balochistan, 9,242 in Islamabad, 1,164 in Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) and 703 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK).
According to the government's Covid-19 portal, the death toll related to coronavirus has reached 2,975 with 136 fatalities reported during the last 24 hours while around 58,437 patients have fully recovered from the disease.
Nearly one-and-a-half months after imposing the lockdown across the country, the government announced to ease the lockdown in phases, however, the number of coronavirus cases has continued to soar.
Meanwhile, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on National Health Services Dr Zafar Mirza on Wednesday said that a technical team in Pakistan will consider using Dexamethasone medicine to treat those critically ill with COVID-19.
In a tweet, he pointed out the World Health Organization (WHO) has welcomed the initial clinical trial results from the United Kingdom that show dexamethasone can be lifesaving for patients who are critically ill with COVID-19.
"It is an old and cheap anti-inflammatory medicine (steroid) and we have multiple producers in Pakistan," the SAPM said.
However, Dr Mirza warned that dexamethasone is only for the use of critically ill COVID-19 patients who are on oxygen and ventilators.
He said the medicine must not be used by mild to moderate patients and that self-medication is strictly prohibited and can be dangerous as the medicine has many side-effects.
It is pertinent to mention that the global coronavirus cases have reportedly surpassed 8.2 million and death toll tops 445,000.
