Health Society & Culture

COVID-19: HPA confirms another 37 persons positive for virus

Health Protection Agency (HPA) on Tuesday confirmed 27 additional persons were found positive for COVID-19 in the Maldives.

According to the agency, the new cases (MAV1106 to MAV1143) include 15 Maldivians and 22 foreigners, of which 19 individuals are from Bangladesh and three are from India.

The patients include one person above the age of 50 and at least three children below the age of 10. Of the 37, eight persons identify as female.

With this development, the total number of confirmed cases in the Maldives is currently at 1,143 with 1,059 cases that are active. The country has reported four fatalities and a total of 80 recoveries till date.

Maldives’ capital Malé, one of the most densely populated cities in the world, has recorded a significant increase in COVID-19 since recording its first local transmission of the virus on April 15, involving a Maldivian woman who sought assistance from a flu clinic in Malé after developing symptoms for the virus.

The COVID-19 outbreak in the capital has disproportionately affected the expatriate population, the majority of whom are Bangladeshi nationals living in highly congested quarters where it is impossible to reduce contact or exercise social distancing. Local and international civil society organizations describe these living quarters as, “claustrophobic”, “unsanitary” and “overcrowded”.

Since the beginning of the community-wide outbreak of COVID-19 in the Maldives, the total number of Bangladeshi expatriates that have tested positive for the virus has surpassed 580. Overall, foreign nationals constitute roughly 65 per cent of all recorded cases in the country.

Bangladeshi citizens make up the majority of the expatriate population in the Maldives, which numbers at over 144,600, out of which authorities earlier estimated that 63,000 were undocumented.

WHO has classified the spread of COVID-19 as a global pandemic. The new strain of novel coronavirus has infected over 4.9 million people and claimed over 320,000 lives around the world. However, out of those infected, 1.9 million people have recovered.

Full details are available at the link below:

Source URL: Google News

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