PESHAWAR: Covid-19 claimed five more lives on Tuesday, taking the death toll to 1,213 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The province also recorded 71 new cases raising the total count of infected people to 34,324, according to a report compiled by the health department. It said 105 patients had recovered from the ailment taking total tally to 29,255.

Two people died of the virus in Peshawar and one each in Swabi, Haripur and Abbottabad.

Peshawar has so far witnessed 577 deaths. It also registered 41 fresh cases in the last 24 hours with total count standing at 12,901.

Swat, which is the second hardest-hit district after Peshawar, had 15 more patients testing positive, taking the total number to 2,894. The district has so far seen 101 virus deaths.

The number of fatalities in Abbottabad has reached 82, with the district having so far reported 1,404 positive cases.

Meanwhile, the number of patients in the medical teaching institutions has declined with the reduction in cases. More than 70 per cent of the Covid-19 beds in the intensive care units have become empty as the number of seriously-ill patients has also declined.

There are only 16 patients in the Lady Reading Hospital with 10 of them positive, and four in the ICU. Same is the case with the Khyber Teaching Hospital where 70 beds are vacant.

However, Swat has 20 per cent positive rate highest by any district in the country, which according to experts, suggests that cases prevailed in the community but couldn’t be detected due to fewer testing.

Published in Dawn, August 5th, 2020