Covid positivity rate remains below 4% three days in a row
Bangladesh has not registered such a low infection rate for three successive days in over ten months
The daily infection rate of the novel coronavirus in Bangladesh has remained below 4% for three days in a row.
As of 8am on Thursday, Bangladesh confirmed 509 Covid-19 positive cases in the last 24 hours, with an infection rate of 3.43%. The positivity rates were 3.36% and 3.58% respectively in the last two days.
Bangladesh has not registered such a low infection rate for three successive days in over ten months.
Professor Nazrul Islam, a noted virologist and former vice-chancellor of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University told The Business Standard, "The coronavirus will transition to an endemic in Bangladesh if the infection rate stands at 5% in three consecutive weeks"
The country's maiden Covid-19 cases were reported on 8 March last year, while the first fatality from the virus was reported on 18 March.
According to a press statement issued by the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) on Thursday, Bangladesh has recorded 5,33,953 Covid-19 confirmed cases with 8,087 deaths thus far.
To date, the country's death rate against the total detected number of cases stands at 1.51%.
In the last 24 hours, ending at 8am on Thursday, 15 more people died from Covid-19 in Bangladesh, said the DGHS media statement.
Of the 15 deceased, 12 were men and three were women. All 15 victims died while undergoing treatment in different hospitals across the country.
Of the fatalities, 12 hailed from Dhaka, with one each from Chattogram, Barishal and Khulna divisions.
According to the media statement, 611 patients were declared free of Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, raising the total number of recoveries to 478,546 with a recovery rate of 89.62%.
4,830 samples were tested in 204 labs across the country in the past 24 hours. With this, a total of 3615,338 samples have been tested in the country so far.