Grim records in deaths, infections

Covid-19 related casualties have continued to surge when Bangladesh set new records in both deaths and cases, with 164 fatalities and 9,964 cases identified over a 24-hour span on Monday. And against this backdrop, the government extended the already enforced strict lockdown for another one week till July 14 in an attempt to prevent the further spread of the pandemic which has so far claimed at least 15,229 lives and infected over 954,881 across the country.

Khulna, a recent hotspot, tallied 55 fatalities on Monday, the most among the eight divisions in the country. Dhaka was second with 40 deaths, followed by Chattogram with 18 and Rangpur and Rajshahi with 16 each.

Dhaka logged the highest daily cases among the eight divisions with 4,250. Khulna saw 1,470 new cases, while Chattogram recorded 1,367, Rajshahi registered 1,123 and Rangpur saw 676.

Nationwide, another 5,185 people recovered from the illness, bringing the total number of recoveries to 839,082.

As many as 34,002 samples were tested across the country, for a positivity rate of 29.30 percent. The latest figures put the recovery rate at 87.87 percent and the mortality rate at 1.59 percent.

Bangladesh is currently facing a renewed surge in Covid-19 cases and deaths, prompting the government to impose its harshest lockdown yet.

After record infections and deaths in April, June was the second cruellest month for Bangladesh since the coronavirus pandemic struck the country in March 2020.

Bangladesh on Monday extended the current stringent lockdown by a week to Jul 14 at the advice of experts to curb infections.

Globally, over 183.82 million people have been infected by the novel coronavirus and over 3.97 million have died, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Infections have been reported in more than 210 countries and territories since the first cases were identified in China in December 2019.