Covid-19: Bangladesh records 21 more deaths, 703 new cases

Bangladesh recorded 21 more deaths from Covid-19 and 703 new cases in the 24 hours between 8am Tuesday and 8am Wednesday.

During the same time, some 817 patients also recovered across the nation, according to the daily bulletin from the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).

The latest data took the country’s death toll to 27,635, total caseload to 1,560,155, and total recoveries to 1,521,113.

The mortality rate remained static at 1.77% while the recovery rate was 97.50%.

In the 24 hours, some 24,376 samples were tested at 821 labs around the country, yielding a 2.88% positivity rate.

The overall test positivity rate now stands at 15.81%.

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The daily case positivity rate has remained below 5% for the 16th consecutive day.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), if the daily-case positivity rate remains at 5% or below for 14 days it is considered to be safe for mass unlocking.

The daily case positivity rate in Bangladesh had reached the highest -- 32.55% -- on July 24 this year.

The seven-day moving average of single-day deaths in Bangladesh was 21.14 on Wednesday.

Dhaka and Chittagong both counted eight deaths each, the highest among the divisions, followed by Khulna and Rangpur with two fatalities each and Sylhet counted one death.

Of the deceased, 20 died at different hospitals across the country and one died at home.

Of the new patients, Dhaka logged 518 cases, the highest among the divisions, followed by Chittagong with 77.

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Bangladesh reported its first three cases of Covid-19, a severe acute respiratory illness caused by a strain of coronavirus later named Sars-CoV-2, on March 8 last year. The first death was reported 10 days later.

The fast-spreading virus has so far claimed over 4.8 million lives and infected more than 236.7 million people throughout the world, according to worldometer.

More than 213.81 million people have recovered from the disease, which has affected 221 countries and territories across the planet.