Technology works: Pakistan effectively fights Covid-19

Over 245,000 patients recovered so far across Pakistan as per daily reports

ISLAMABAD:

When many countries in the world are reporting thousands of cases a day, Pakistan seems little to worry about this pandemic as on Wednesday the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) reported only 1,879 patients admitted to 734 hospitals across the country.

As per latest daily, more than 245,000 patients recovered so far across Pakistan making it a significant count while only 227 ventilators have been occupied across the country out of 1,859 vents allocated for Covid-19.

All this was made possible due to improving testing capacity as 1,909,846 tests have been conducted so far with 21,256 tests in just last 24 hours. Only 936 new cases were reported across the country during last 24 hours while 21,256 tests were conducted in a day.

Pakistan had move away from the past practice of normal manual level of tackling the pandemic to technology evidence based method as this model had worked well in China.

Terming the Pakistan’s early success in controlling Covid-19, as ‘crushing the curve’, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on National Health Services Dr Zafar Mirza, who has resigned from the post earlier today, said: “Alhamdulillah, we have the lowest number of deaths in Pakistan due to Covid-19 in last three months.”

He added: “We had a peak of 153 deaths on June 20 and in last 24 hours we had just 20 deaths. This is 87% reduction in Covid-19 related deaths. Due to the government’s effective strategy the cases of coronavirus are decreasing and the situation is improving in the country.”

Pakistan relied on technology and understanding. Its decision making was based on information and reliable data of NCOC. The practice of data collection, correlation, collation and informed decisions making helped in containment efforts.

“Our strategy was based on speedy testing, contact tracing and isolation, ensuring services to admitted patients and observing shortages and immediately addressing these shortages through use of domestic technology,” an official at the Health Ministry said.

The NCOC moved scientifically and identified top 30 cities as Covid-19 hotspots with max Infected using auto trace and NITB maps. At an average 3-8 million population with 10-30% of infected people remained under 300-500 smart lockdowns (SLDs) on rolling basis since adoption of this policy in entire country.