ISLAMABAD: The national Covid-19 positivity rate, the proportion of people who tested positive for the disease, more than doubled to 5.5 per cent on Tuesday as fewer citizens sought out tests during Eidul Azha.
Official data released by the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) showed on Tuesday the number of Covid tests conducted across the country over the past 24 hours dropped by more than a third to 4,674 from 15,038 a day earlier. And it was a far cry from this month’s highest tally of 23,125 reported on July 7.
The highest positivity rate of 39.46pc was reported from Karachi (based on 161 positive results from 408 tests), followed by Islamabad 7.69pc, Hyderabad 5.17pc, Lahore 4.65pc and Peshawar 3.93pc.
One patient succumbed to the virus, whereas 141 remained in critical care, data showed.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of National Health Services, Sajid Shah, said a decline in the number of tests was expected during religious festivals and hoped that it would return to normal in a few days.
Rate in Karachi reaches alarming level of around 40pc
“People don’t want to get themselves tested during Eid due to different engagements and travelling,” he said. “Outpatient departments of government hospitals also remain closed during Eid holidays and private labs also conduct fewer tests.”
Mr Shah also expected a drop in the national positivity rate after testing improves in the coming days.
AFP adds: Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation’s chief lamented on Tuesday that fresh surges of Covid infections show the pandemic is nowhere near over, warning that the virus is running free.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was worried that case numbers were shooting up, putting more strain on health systems and workers.
The number of Covid cases reported to the WHO increased 30pc in the past two weeks, driven by sub-variants of the Omicron strain and the lifting of control measures.
“New waves of the virus demonstrate again that Covid-19 is nowhere near over. As the virus pushes at us, we must push back,” he insisted.
He told a news conference that as transmission increases, governments must also deploy tried-and-tested measures like mask-wearing and improving ventilation.
“Sub-variants of Omicron, like BA.4 and BA.5, continue to drive waves of cases, hospitalisation and death around the world,” Mr Tedros said.
“Surveillance has reduced significantly — including testing and sequencing — making it increasingly difficult to assess the impact of variants on transmission, disease characteristics, and the effectiveness of counter-measures.”
Furthermore, tests, treatments and vaccines are not being deployed effectively.
“The virus is running freely and countries are not effectively managing the disease burden based on their capacity,” he said, both in terms of hospitalisation of acute cases and the expanding number of people with Long Covid.
‘Uncertain and unpredictable’
The WHO’s Covid-19 emergency committee met Friday via video conference and determined the pandemic remains a Public Health Emergency of International Concern — the highest alarm the WHO can sound.
WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan told the meeting recent changes in testing policies were hindering the detection of cases and the monitoring of virus evolution.
The committee stressed the need to reduce transmission as the implications of a pandemic caused by a new respiratory virus would not be fully understood, the WHO said in a statement Monday.
The group voiced concern over steep reductions in testing, resulting in reduced surveillance and genomic sequencing.
“This impedes assessments of currently circulating and emerging variants of the virus,” the WHO said, feeding the inability to interpret trends in transmission.
The committee said the trajectory of virus evolution and the characteristics of emerging variants remained “uncertain and unpredictable”.
It said the absence of measures to reduce transmission increases the likelihood of “new, fitter variants emerging, with different degrees of virulence, transmissibility, and immune escape potential”.
Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2022
