Strict Implementation Of SOPs Can Help Reduce Coronavirus Positivity Rate: Dr Yasmin

LAHORE, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 2nd May, 2021 ) :Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid said on Sunday that coronavirus infection rate could only be overcome by strictly implementation of coronavirus SOPs devised by the health department.

Briefing the media here, she said that in the provincial capital, where the infection rate was 23 per cent, the Punjab government implemented SOPs strictly, and now the corona positivity rate had reduced to 18 per cent.

She said that COVID-19 patients were facing difficulties in Gujranwala district where the occupancy rate of ventilators was 100 percent so the health department had decided to send five more ventilators over there.

The minister announced that all kinds of gatherings including indoor and outdoor as well as processions across the province had been banned to tackle the acceleration of the disease.

She said that Punjab remained the worst-hit province in terms of deaths and cases followed by Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

She said that 8,550 people had lost their lives to the pandemic in Punjab, 4,658 in Sindh, 3,350 in KP, 691 in Islamabad, 477 in Azad Kashmir, 237 in Balochistan, and 107 in GB.

As many as 304,889 coronavirus cases had been confirmed in Punjab, 284,738 in Sindh, 119,277 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 75,892 in Islamabad, 22,528 in Balochistan, 17,297 in Azad Kashmir and 5,312 in Gilgit-Baltistan till today (Sunday) morning.

To a question, she informed that the most affected area in Punjab remained Layyah where positivity rate of coronavirus surged to 31 per cent.

To a question about oxygen supply, she said the Punjab health department had set up a 280-bed field hospital in the Lahore Expo Centre with uninterrupted oxygen supply, adding that 10 ventilators had also been installed there.

The minister said that the government had decided to install oxygen generators at big teaching hospitals across the province while the procurement for generators had already been started.

"All these preparations have been made to prevent any emergency situation", she cleared.

About vaccination, Dr Yasmin Rashid said that Punjab was the province where the most number of people were getting vaccinated.

"The NCOC has given us a target of vaccinating 80,000 people in a day and yesterday we injected 78,000 people", she informed.

She said that 135 vaccination centres had been set up in Punjab and the government had decided to increase the number by adding 7 more centres.

"Three more vaccination centres will be opened in Lahore and one each in Multan, Gujranwala andRawalpindi," she added.

The minister informed that Punjab was vaccinating Cansino, Sinovac and Sinopharm vaccines.