Turkey reports over 145,000 recoveries from virus

By Firdevs Bulut and Burak Bir

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey on Wednesday confirmed 2,241 daily recoveries from the novel coronavirus, as the country continues easing measures against the pandemic, according to its health minister.

The total number of recoveries from the disease hit 146,839, as 2,241 more patients were discharged from hospitals over the past day, Fahrettin Koca said at a news conference after the Science Council meeting, citing Health Ministry data.

"Following stay-home orders for those over the age of 65 years, rate of COVID-19 infection in this age group declined by 50%," the minister said.

Koca said that guideline in the process of normalization is the fact that the risk continues, adding it will be possible to reach the very last case only by following the measures.

The country's death toll from the virus rose to 4,746, as it reported 17 new fatalities over the last 24 hours.

Healthcare professionals performed 36,521 tests for the disease in the past 24 hours, raising the total number to more than 2.45 million.

According to test results, the total number of COVID-19 cases nationwide reached 173,036, with 922 new infections.

Since first appearing in China last December, the novel coronavirus has spread to at least 188 countries and regions.

The US, Brazil, Russia and several European countries are currently the hardest-hit in the world.

The pandemic has killed more than 412,700 people worldwide, with over 7.28 million confirmed cases and more than 3.4 million recoveries, according to figures compiled by the US’ Johns Hopkins University.