Unlike India, Pakistan among 'fortunate' countries seeing virus cases, deaths drop: PM

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan in a series of tweets on Friday said Pakistan is amongst the “fortunate” countries where Covid-19 cases and death rate have gone down.

“Unlike in our unfortunate neighbor India”, the prime minister said, “Pak is amongst the fortunate countries where COVID 19 cases in hospitals, esp[ecially] in intensive care & death rate have gone down.”

He added this positive trend has been the result of our smart lockdown policy and the nation observing the government-defined standard operating procedures (SOPs).

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Prime Minister Khan urged the nation to continue observing SOPs, which, he said, is essential to sustain the positive trend. “Eid ul Azha must be celebrated with simplicity so as not to repeat what happened last Eid when SOPs were ignored & our hospitals were choked.”

I urge the nation to continue observing SOPs essential to sustain our positive trend. Eid ul Azha must be celebrated with simplicity so as not to repeat what happened last Eid when SOPs were ignored & our hospitals were choked. I am ordering strict implementation of govt SOPs.

— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) July 17, 2020

He ordered strict implementation of the SOPs.

Pakistan reported 2,085 new coronavirus cases and 49 deaths over the past 24 hours, taking the total number of cases to 259,998 and fatalities to 5,475. According to the government’s Covid-19 portal, 23,907 tests were conducted during the last 24 hours.

The total number of recovered patients in the country has mounted to 183,737 while 70,787 people are under treatment, of whom 1,895 are in critical condition. A total of 16,760,90 tests have thus far been conducted.