Covid positivity tops 5% after 15 weeks

Bangladesh on Friday recorded another 1,146 new cases of Covid-19, with the country’s daily test positivity rate spiking to 5.67 per cent.

In the 24 hours to Friday, the country also registered one death, pushing the tally up to 28,098.

Earlier on September 20, last year, the test positivity rate was above five. The detection rate on the day was 5.6 per cent.

Bangladesh’s test positivity rate has been witnessing an upward trend since the start of this month, rising from 2.43 per cent on January 1.

On Thursday, the positivity rate was at 4.86 per cent.

With the latest developments, the number of all confirmed cases now stands at 15,91,093, according to the daily virus update by the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) released on Friday afternoon.

Health authorities reported the latest figures after testing 20,204 samples at 852 laboratories across the country in the last 24 hours. Bangladesh has so far tested 1,16,30,540 samples.

Meanwhile, 170 patients recovered from the deadly infection in the last 24-hours, raising the overall recovery to 15,50,534. Bangladesh reported its first cases on March 8 last year and the first coronavirus-related death on March 18 the same year.

The daily-case positivity rate reached its peak 32.55 per cent on July 24 last year.

Dhaka, Chattogram, Rajshahi, Khulna, Barisal, Sylhet, Rangpur, and Mymensingh all registered new cases on Friday.

Dhaka recorded 920 new Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, the highest among all the divisions. Barisal recorded 5 cases, which was the lowest.

Meanwhile, Chattogram recorded 112, Rajshahi 52, Khulna 23, Sylhet 13, Mymensingh 11, and Rangpur 10 new cases.

Meanwhile, the global Covid-19 caseload reached 30,04,14,180 and the death toll to 54,74,029 till Friday, according to a US-based Johns Hopkins University (JHU) update.