Bangladesh surpasses China’s number of Covid-19 cases

Bangladesh's tally of confirmed Covid-19 cases has surpassed China – reaching 84,379 on Saturday.

China, so far, has reported 83,075 cases and 4,634 deaths since the beginning of the outbreak last December in the country.

China, the world's most populous country, has a population of 1.4 billion, while the current population of Bangladesh is about 164 million.

In 24 hours till 8am on Saturday, 13,638 samples were tested by 59 labs across Bangladesh, said sources at the Directorate General of Health Services.

The country, on Saturday, confirmed 44 more deaths from the novel coronavirus and 2,856 new cases.

With this, the death toll from the deadly virus rose to 1,139 and the total number of infections stood at 84,379 in the country.

"Among the dead patients, 33 were men and 11 women. Of them, 19 were from Dhaka, 13 from Chattogram, four, each, from Rajshahi and Barishal, two from Sylhet, and one from Khulna," Additional Director General of DGHS Professor Dr Nasima Sultana disclosed during a virtual briefing on Saturday.

Twenty-seven of these patients died in different hospitals, 14 at their homes and three were diagnosed with the infection after their deaths.

Some 578 patients recovered from the virus during this time, increasing the tally of recovered to 17,827.

According to the latest data provided by the DGHS, 21.13 percent of novel coronavirus patients have recovered and 1.35 percent have died.

The rate of Covid-19 positive cases among the tested samples was 17.17 percent on Saturday.

Currently, 60,785 people are quarantined across the country – including 2,414 newly-quarantined individuals. A total of 256,859 people have completed their quarantine course.

Nasima said, "The authorities placed 496 individuals suspected of having Covid-19 into isolation in the last 24 hours."

"The country is capable of accommodating 13,284 people in different isolation wards and 31,991 people in 629 institutional quarantine facilities," she added.