KARACHI: Presiding over a meeting, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has decided to distribute 500 oxygenated beds — 72 intensive care units (ICU) and 428 high-dependency unit (HDU) — to six different government hospitals in Karachi.

The meeting was attended by relevant government officials.

The chief minister said every government hospital in different localities of the city should have ICU and HDU wards.

Shah also directed the officials concerned to provide necessary equipment to the field isolation centre, Expo Centre Karachi.

It may be noted that these 500 beds have been provided by the National Disaster Management Authority to the Sindh government.

17 Covid-19 patients lose their lives

Murad Ali Shah on Friday said that as many as 2,428 new cases of coronavirus emerged when 11,356 samples were tested while 17 more patients lost their lives lifting the death toll to 793.

This was stated by Shah in a statement issued from CM House.

He said that overnight 11,356 tests were conducted which detected 22 per cent positive results or 2,428 new cases.

So far, 227,054 samples have been tested which produced 49,256 cases that constituted 18pc positive results, he added.

Syed Murad Ali Shah said that now Sindh had 793 deaths stemming from coronavirus, including 17 reported within the last 24 hours. He added that the death rate had been recorded at 1.6pc.

According to the CM, 25,350 patients of coronavirus are under treatment, of them 23,615 at home isolation, 79 at isolation centres and 1,656 at different hospitals.

“I am sorry to disclose that 530 patients are in critical condition, of them 83 have been shifted on ventilators,” he said.

A total of 1,066 more patients have recovered and been discharged and now the number of patients recovered from coronavirus has reached 23,113, which shows a 47pc recovery rate.

The chief minister said that out of 2,428 cases of coronavirus, 1,641 belonged to Karachi. They include 571 in East, 351 in South, 265 in Central, 207 in West, 176 in Malir and 125 in Korangi, he added.

He said that Karachi being a densely populated city was worst affected, therefore people of this city would have to take extra precautionary measures.

Talking about other districts of the province, he said that Ghotki had 66 cases, Hyderabad 64, Sukkur 47, Khairpur 38, Larkana 31, Jacobabad 26, Dadu 20, Nawabshah and Sanghar 17 each, Jamshoro 14, Qambar nine, Kashmore, Mirpurkhas and Thatta have seven cases each, Tando Mohammad Khan three and Umerkot two.

All these cases are of local transmission and this could be stopped with support of people of the area, otherwise control would be very difficult, he said.

He urged the people of Sindh to adopt SOPs, wear masks and avoid social gatherings.

Published in Dawn, June 13th, 2020