Bangladesh logs record 28 deaths, 1532 more virus cases

Bangladesh’s confirmed coronavirus cases have risen to 33,610 as the health authorities announced the detection of 1532 new cases testing 8908 samples in 47 laboratories across the country on Sunday.

The death toll in the highly infectious lung disease virus in the country has increased to 480 with record 28 deaths in the last 24 hours until Sunday morning.

The number of patients recovered during that time is 415. With this the number of patients recovered from the highly infectious disease stands at 6901.

Additional director general of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) professor Nasima Sultana said this at a daily online briefing.

The country has seen a spike in the number of new cases and deaths in recent weeks.

The DGHS on Saturday announced detection of 1873 new cases and 20 deaths. Earlier on Friday, the health authorities said 1694 new cases and 24 deaths were recorded.

Since coronavirus infection was first reported in China in December last year, there have been more than 5.3 million cases globally, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Coronavirus was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organisation (WHO) on 11 March.

The virus outbreak dealt a heavy blow to the global economy, disrupting the supply chain and forcing countries to go into prolonged lockdowns.

Bangladesh government declared a general holiday since 26 March to slow down the transmission of the virus. But the move left millions without a job and a large section of people appear to be reluctant to maintain health guidelines.

The government has announced a series of stimulus packages to tackle the economic fallout of the shutdown.