– Bangladesh today recorded 164 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) deaths and 9,964 positive cases in the past 24 hours, the highest number in a single day in terms of both fatality and infection since the pandemic began.
“The country reported 29.30 percent COVID-19 positive cases, the highest in a single day as 34,002 samples were tested in the past 24 hours while it registered 8,822 positive cases on June 30, the second highest in a day, ” Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) said in its routine daily statement.
Both infections and fatalities of coronavirus continued to rise sharply in the past several days while the government has extended the ongoing lockdown till midnight of July 14. Earlier, the government decided to impose a nationwide seven-day lockdown till July 7 to contain transmission of the deadly virus.
As part of intensifying the mass inoculation drive, the government decided to lower the minimum age by five years as now people aged 40 years and above are allowed to receive COVID-19 vaccines.
“The government has set the minimum age for receiving COVID-19 vaccines to 35 years…a notification in this regard will be issued within one or two days,” Director General of Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) Prof Dr Abul Bashar Mohammad Khurshid Alam told journalists today.
The official tally showed the virus killed 15,229 people and infected 9,54,881 so far, it added.
The recovery count rose to 8,39,082 after another 5,185 patients were discharged from the hospitals during the past one day.
The DGHS statistics showed of the people infected from the beginning 87.87 percent recovered, while 1.59 percent died.
The DGHS said among the total 15,229 fatalities, 7,768 deaths occurred in Dhaka division, 2,833 in Chattogram, 1,128 in Rajshahi, 1,491 in Khulna, 448 in Barishal, 547 in Sylhet, 673 in Rangpur and 341 in Mymensingh diviion.
The DGHS said Bangladesh’s COVID-19 confirmed cases crossed 5,000 mark on March 29, 2021 and 6,000 mark on April 1, 202, 7,000 mark on April 4, 2021, 8,000 mark on June 24, 2021.
According to month-wise statistics last year, 51 COVID-19 positive cases were detected in March 2020, 7616 in April, 39,486 in May, 98,330 in June, 92,178 in July, 75,335 in August, 50,483 in September, 44, 205 in October, 57,248 in November and 48,578 in December.
The beginning of the current year witnessed a drastic fall of coronavirus cases in the country but the trend lasted for only two months — 21,629 cases were detected in January and 11,077 in February.
After the drastic fall of COVID-19 confirmed cases, the country witnessed sharp increase of infection as 65,079 cases were reported in March, 2021 and 1,47,837 cases in April. The country again witnessed a fall in May, 2021 as it recorded 41,408 cases. From the beginning of June, 2021, the country recorded a sharp rise with 1,12,718 cases, the DGHS said.
According to month-wise statistics last year, five COVID-19 deaths were reported in March, 2020, 163 in April, 482 in May, 1,197 in June, 1,264 in July, 1,179 in August, 970 in September, 672 in October, 721 in November and 915 in December.
Month-wise data of the current year, 568 coronavirus fatalities were recorded in January, 2021, 281 in February, 638 in March and 2,404 in April, 1,169 in May and 1,884 in June, the DGHS sources said.
To receive information and treatment facilities on COVID-19, the contact hotline and mobile numbers are 16263; 333; 10655 and 01944333222.
As of July 5, 2021, 13.18 GMT, 3,995,598 people have died so far from the COVID-19 outbreak and there are currently 184,689,144 confirmed cases in 212 countries and territories, according to Worldometer, a reference website that provides counters and real-time statistics for diverse topics.
China was the world’s first country which on January 11, 2020 reported the first death from the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, the capital of Central China’s Hubei province.