Fifth Covid wave shows signs of plateauing

Single day tally of new cases drops below 3,000

ISLAMABAD:

The single day tally of new Covid cases fell below 3,000 for the first time in almost a month on Tuesday, while the national positivity ratio also dropped by more than 2% from a day earlier, according to the official data, which suggested that peak of the fifth wave of the pandemic may have passed.

The National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC), which serves as the nerve centre of the government’s unified anti-Covid strategy, said in its daily update that 2,799 new coronavirus cases were reported in the last 24 hours at a positivity ratio of 5.3%.

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The NCOC had reported less than 3,000 new cases on January 11. Also the national positivity ratio is also the lowest in slightly over three weeks. On Monday, the NCOC had reported 3,338 new cases, while the positivity ratio was 7.5%.

Most of the cases reported on Tuesday, 974 were registered in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, followed by 850 in Sindh and 448 in Punjab. The forum said that 4,786 patients recovered in the last 24 hours, reducing the number of active cases to 87,168, including 1,668 patients in critical condition.