Bangladesh witnessed a big jump in the number of Covid-19 deaths and infections as health authorities recorded 30 more deaths and 2,809 new cases in the last 24 hours until Monday morning.
With the new cases, Bangladesh saw the worst daily increase since January this year. The infection rate jumped to 11.19 percent which was 10.29 percent a day before.
Health experts said poor adherence to health safety rules is causing the quick surge in the virus infection rate in the country. The detection of its new variant has also become a cause of concern.
Ten EU-returnees have so far been detected with the new strain of Covid-19 in Bangladesh that was first reported in the UK, said Health Minister Zahid Maleque on March 17.
With the latest figures, the death toll from Covid-19 in Bangladesh surged to 8,720 and the total infections to 573,687, said the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
A DGHS handout said the mortality rate in Bangladesh stood at 1.52 percent for the fourth consecutive day after remaining static at 1.53 percent for the past week.
The coronavirus situation in Bangladesh is changing fast after showing a downtrend in both the death toll and new cases.
On January 19 last, Bangladesh reported its virus infection rate just 5 percent and at one stage it fell below 3 percent. The virus cases have started soaring again on February 9.
In Bangladesh, the DGHS media release says, 524,159 patients – 91.37 percent – have so far recovered from the virus infection, including 1,754 in the last 24 hours.
Bangladesh reported its first Covid-19 cases on March 8, 2020 while the first death on March 18 the same year.
As of Sunday, some 4,434,230 samples have been tested across the country, including 25,111 in the past 24 hours.
Meanwhile, the nationwide Covid-19 vaccination drive is on in the country. Bangladesh vaccinated 4,840,969 people since it rolled out the drive on February 7 with the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab.
Elsewhere in the world, over 123 million people have been infected with the deadly virus till Monday, according to information provided by the Johns Hopkins University (JHU).
