The province-wise break up of the total number of cases as of 4:55pm, May 7, is as follows: highest in Punjab 9,195 cases, followed by Sindh 9,093 cases, the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa 3,712 cases, Balochistan 1,663 cases, the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) 521 cases, Gilgit-Baltistan 388 cases, and Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) 76 cases.

So far, the coronavirus has claimed 585 lives in Pakistan, of which 203 in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 171 in Sindh, 182 in Punjab, 22 in Balochistan, three in Gilgit-Baltistan, and four in ICT.

Officials have recorded more than 3.85 million cases and more than 266,076 deaths worldwide since the virus emerged in China in December 2019.

On Thursday, Sindh and Punjab both crossed 9,000 cases and reported their highest daily death tolls.

Punjab reported 26 deaths, the highest single-day total of any province so far, while Sindh reported 14 deaths.

The total number of deaths countrywide reached 585, registering a 100 percent increase over the last 10 days.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister's Special Assistant on National Security Division Dr Moeed Yusuf has announced that 40,000 stranded Pakistanis will be brought back in the next week. Yusuf said all the stranded Pakistanis would be brought back, adding, "so far, 20,000 overseas Pakistanis have been brought back from various countries."

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020