ISLAMABAD: Opposition leader in Pakistan’s national assembly, Shehbaz Sharif, has quarantined himself at home in Lahore after testing positive for coronavirus on Thursday, his party Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) confirmed.
Sharif, 68, is president of the PML-N and younger brother of the country’s thrice former prime minister Nawaz Sharif who jumped a medical bail granted in corruption cases and currently resides in UK.
Pakistan has seen sharp increase in virus infections since the federal government eased lockdown in mid May, just a bit before Eid.
Asad Qaiser, speaker of the national assembly, earlier aid this week that 13 members of the House had tested positive for the disease, in addition to several staff members.
On Monday, Pakistan’s former prime minister, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Federal Minister for Railways Sheikh Rashid Ahmad also tested positive for coronavirus.
Meanwhile Pakistan’s coronavirus cases soared to 119,536 as 5,834 new infections were reported in the last 24 hours, ministry of health’s national dashboard on COVID-19 said on Thursday. With 101 new fatalities, the death toll risen to 2,356 from coronavirus on Thursday.
According to official statistics 45,463 cases in Punjab, 43,790 in Sindh, 15,206 in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 7,335 in Balochistan, 1,018 in Gilgit-Baltistan, 6,236 in Islamabad and 488 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir.
World Health Organization (WHO), this week, had asked Pakistan to re-impose intermittent lockdowns to curb the virus cases.
In reply to WHO recommendation Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr. Zafar Mirza said on Wednesday that the World Health Organization was only considering the health perspective while suggesting intermittent lockdowns to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus in the country, adding that the government had to keep an eye on the “holistic picture” while developing its strategy.
“We have to make tough policy choices to strike a balance between lives and livelihoods,” he was quoted as saying in a statement released by the health ministry. “We have consciously but gradually eased generalized lockdowns but at the same time we have focused on the enforcement of [precautionary measures] in shops, industries, mosques and public transport.”
“Along with this,” he continued, “we have developed a robust tracing, testing and quarantine policy to identify hotspots and cordon them off. Currently, there are more than 700 such smart lockdowns in place. The other plank of our strategy is ramping up of our health system’s capacity to cater to the growing number of patients.”
