309 lives lost to Covid in Dec thus far, says CM

Sindh reports another 1,374 cases, 33 deaths

KARACHI:

Another 33 coronavirus deaths have been reported in the province, lifting the death toll here to 3,270, said Sindh Chief Minister (CM) Syed Murad Ali Shah in a statement issued on Thursday.

The CM said as many as 119 people died due to Covid-19 in October, another 331 in November and an astounding 309 fatalities have been reported just halfway into December.

"The situation is quite painful, and therefore we all have to abide by the [pandemic-related] standard operating procedures," he said, adding that recovery rate in Sindh, too, had dropped from 95 per cent to 88.5 per cent.

Moreover, he said 1,374 fresh Covid-19 cases were reported on the day, when 12,859 samples were tested. The province's virus tally now stands at 201,080, the CM added.

He further stated that positivity ratio in Karachi was recorded at 19.53 per cent, in Hyderabad at 9.51 per cent and in the rest of the province at 3.98 per cent over the last 10 days.

On new recoveries, the CM said that 1,690 patients had recuperated, taking the total number of recoveries to 178,032.

As of now, he said, there are 19,783 active Covid-19 cases in Sindh, with 18,905 in home isolation, 864 in hospitals and 14 in isolation centres.

He added that among them, the condition of 761 patients was critical and 73 were on ventilators. Sharing the data of the newly reported cases, he said as many as 1,093 cases had emerged in Karachi.

He further said that 36 fresh cases were detected in Shaheed Benazirabad, 30 in Hyderabad, 25 in Matiari, 21 in Kashmore-Kandhkot, 15 in Qambar-Shahdadkot, 12 in Khairpur, 10 each in Jamshoro, Ghotki and Larkana, nine in Umerkot, eight each in Sujawal and Jacobabad, seven each in Sukkur and Naushehro Feroze, six each in Tando Allahyar and Thatta, five in Mirpurkhas and three in Shikarpur.