Pakistan has conducted 14,878 tests of coronavirus in the last 24 hours, the highest number since the first case of the global pandemic was reported in the country.

The NCOC meeting, chaired by Minister of Planning and Development Reforms Asad Omar, saw a 30-fold increase in testing capacity in the country and also the meeting expressed satisfaction as the number of coronavirus testing laboratories increased from 2 to 70 since mid-March.

During the meeting, Asad Omar said that standard operating procedures (SOPs) and social distance can be implemented through public awareness.

The leadership of Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir, including the Chief Ministers of the provinces, gave their views on the decisions taken after May 9, Eid prayer gatherings and implementation of SOPs and health protocols for industries and markets.

The NCOC meeting said that market associations / traders’ organizations should ensure compliance with the SOPs issued by the Ministry of Health or else the market should be shut down for failing to meet SOPs.

Asad Omar said that the testing capacity in the country is increasing and more than 14,000 tests have been done which is encouraging and this number should be further increased.

It may be recalled that the number of people infected with the global coronavirus pandemic in Pakistan has risen to 39,473 while 847 people have died.

Note that the confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the country is 39473 out of which 836 have died while 10880 have been recovered so the number of active cases is 27,746.

The number of people infected with the virus in Sindh is 15,590 while in Punjab it is 14,201.

Similarly, 5678 people have been affected in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa while the number has reached 2457 in Balochistan.

Coronavirus has affected 921 people in Islamabad, 518 in Gilgit-Baltistan and 108 in Azad Kashmir.

The coronavirus death toll throughout the country is as follow,

• Khyber Pakhtunkhwa: 291
• Sindh: 268
• Punjab: 245
• Balochistan: 31
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• Islamabad: 07
• Gilgit-Baltistan: 04
• Azad Kashmir: 01

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