COVID-19: Pakistan's cases near 6,000, deaths top 100

By Islamuddin Sajid

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AA) - The number of coronavirus cases in Pakistan rose to almost 6,000, with 107 confirmed deaths, the country’s Health Ministry said on Wednesday.

According to the Federal Health Ministry, confirmed cases in the country rose to 5,988 after 272 new cases were reported over the past 24 hours.

The country also reported 11 more deaths, highest in a day so far, raising the fatalities to 107, while 1,446 patients have recovered and discharged from the hospitals.

A total of 73,439 people have been tested in the country of over 200 million people, with 3,280 tests conducted over the past 24 hours.

With 2,945, cases, the northeastern Punjab province -- which accounts for more than half of the country’s population -- is the worst-hit area in Pakistan.

The southern Sindh province has 1,518 cases, northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has 865, and southwestern Balochistan province 240, according to the ministry’s data.

The northern Gilgit-Baltistan region accounts for 234 of the country’s total cases, while the capital Islamabad has 140, and Azad Jammu and Kashmir 46 cases so far.

Official data showed that the recovery ratio in the confirmed cases is 24.1% while the death ratio stands at 1.8%, slightly high compared to last week's 1.5%.

Lahore, the provincial capital of Punjab province, is so far the worst-hit city with over 20% cases of the total 5,988, while the southern port city of Karachi ranks the second with 17.68% of the infections.

Since the virus emerged last December in the Chinese city of Wuhan, it has spread to at least 185 countries and regions.

There are over 1.98 million confirmed cases globally and more than 126,700 deaths, according to the U.S.-based Johns Hopkins University. The recoveries exceeded 493,600 so far.