Pakistan extends COVID-19 restrictions till April 13 as infections surge

Pakistan has extended coronavirus restrictions till April 13 as the country is witnessing a surge in COVID-19 cases with over 5,000 cases reported on Sunday. According to a statement released by Pakistan's National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC), the country's government has decided to extend coronavirus restrictions in place till April 13, Pakistan's Dawn reported.

With a positivity rate of 10.96 per cent, Pakistan has reported 5,050 infections in the last 24 hours. With this, the cumulative count of COVID-19 cases in the country has reached 7,15,968. As the third wave of the pandemic surges in Pakistan, the country registered 100 coronavirus deaths for a second consecutive day. A hundred deaths were recorded during the last 24 hours while 105 were reported a day earlier.

So far, 15,329 people have died due to the infection. The NCOC session, chaired by Minister for Planning and Development Asad Umar, concluded that further discussions and decisions on non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) during Ramazan will take place on Monday with a particular focus on the mechanism of their implementation.

The NCOC session also discussed Pakistan's COVID-19 inoculation campaign during Ramazan and said a sufficient quantity of vaccines was scheduled to arrive after mid-April. The NCOC had announced various restrictions across the country a few days earlier, as the third wave of the coronavirus intensified across the country with over 5,000 testings positive for the virus on a single day, multiple times in the past few weeks or so.

Punjab province has reported the highest number of cases. The province registered 2,628 infection and 57 deaths during the last 24 hours. The provincial total is 2,45,923 and the death toll is 6,908. The province of Sindh has reported 466 new cases of the coronavirus and six deaths in the last 24 hours, according to an update from Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah.

This has taken the provincial caseload to 2,68,750 and the death toll to 4,529.