One more dies of COVID, 26 new cases reported in a day

Another person has died from COVID-19 in Bangladesh in the past 24 hours, taking the total number of virus-related fatalities this year to four.

The deceased was a man aged between 41 and 50. He was undergoing treatment at a state-run hospital in Dhaka.

A total of 26 people have been tested positive for the virus as of Sunday morning, bringing the total number of patients identified this year to 288.

Of them, 130 were infected in the first 14 days of June.

The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) said the 26 patients were identified by testing 291 samples. According to the tested samples, the detection rate is 8.93 percent.

Among the new patients, 12 people tested positive from 60 samples in Dhaka, 11 from 178 samples in Chattogram, two from 30 samples in Rajshahi, and one from eight samples in Sylhet.

Since the emergence of the COVID-19 infection in Bangladesh in 2020, as many as 2.05 million patients have been identified from 15.72 million samples until Saturday. Of these, 29,503 people have died.

In 2020, 7,559 people died due to the virus.

The highest death toll was in 2021, with 20,513 deaths. Then, 1,368 people died in 2022, 37 in 2023, and 22 in 2024.

The DGHS has issued a new alert following a spike in infections from a new COVID-19 sub-variant in several neighbouring countries, including India, amid concerns over its potential spread elsewhere.

On Monday, the DGHS’s communicable disease control branch asked people to refrain from travelling to India and other countries where the outbreak is spreading, except for urgent needs.

It has also asked to increase health screening and surveillance at all places and airports to address the risk.