Covid infection rate jumps to near 15%

Bangladesh reported a sharp rise in coronavirus infection as the health authorities recorded 641 new cases with 14.73 percent positivity rate, up from 12.73 percent on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, no death from the virus was recorded, remaining the death toll static at 29,345, according to a handout of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).

The new cases were detected after testing 4,351 samples, mounting the caseload to 20,19,470 as of Wednesday.

Some, 220 patients recovered from the virus-related illness and with it, the total number of recovery reached j19,61,480.

The mortality rate remained unchanged at 1.45 percent while the recovery rate declined to 97.13 percent from Tuesday’s 97.15 percent.

The health authorities also detected 538 cases in Dhaka, 10 in Mymensingh, 27 in Chattogram, 26 in Rajshahi, four in Rangpur, 19 in Khulna, nine in Barishal and eight in Sylhet divisions during the period.

The country reported its first zero Covid-related death in a single day on November 20 last year, along with 178 infections.

On January 28, Bangladesh registered its previous highest daily positivity rate at 33.37 percent reporting 15,440 cases and 20 deaths.

The country registered the highest daily caseload of 16,230 on July 28 last year, while the highest number of daily fatalities was 264 on August 10 last year.

Since the outbreak of the virus in Wuhan province in China in 2019, the health authorities in Bangladesh confirmed the first case on March 8, 2020, and the first death on March 18 of the same year.

Worldometer, a reference website that provides counters and real-time statistics for diverse topics, has recorded 65, 33, 626 deaths so far caused by the virus and 61, 82, 10, 295 cases worldwide.