Zafar Mirza says only 25pc health assets utilized so far as coronavirus cases surge    

ISLAMABAD: Special Assistant to Prime Minister (SAPM) on Health Affairs Dr Zafar Mirza on Saturday said that overall 66,457 people have been confirmed as coronavirus patients in Pakistan out of 532,000 people tested for it, ARY NEWS reported.

“The death toll in the country has reached upto 1,395,” he said while addressing a presser flanked by SAPM on National Security Moeed Yusuf.

He said that the virus is spreading in the country with most of it being attributed to its local transmission among the community members. “92 percent cases are of local transmission of virus,” he said.

“78 people including four health workers were the latest to become victim of coronavirus during past 24 hours,” he said adding that safeguarding frontline workers was among their top priority.

While asking people to refrain from spreading propaganda regarding coronavirus, the special assistant on health affairs said that no one would be allowed to resort to violence at hospitals treating COVID-19 patients.

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“We have only utilized 25 percent of the heath resources of the country to deal with the pandemic,” Zafar Mirza said while rejecting any impression that rising cases has caused shortage of health resources.

He further said that 36 percent of the virus-affected patients have recovered in the country and asked the masses to strictly adopt the preventive measures.

“The government is going to make use of mask as mandatory,” he said while citing it a major tool to stop virus spread and asked the public to use it whenever they go outside.