Coronavirus cases in Pak reaches 33

Islamabad, March 15 (IANS) With the emergence of five new cases of the novel coronavirus in Pakistan, the total number of COVID-19 infections in the country has increased to 33.

On Saturday, Balochistan reported two cases, Karachi two and Islamabad one, reports The Express Tribune.

A woman, who had recently arrived in Islamabad from the US, was tested positive at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) on Saturday, the health facility's spokesperson Waseem Khawaja confirmed.

The patient is in critical condition and has been put on ventilator, he added.

With two fresh cases of COVID-19 in Karachi, the tally in Sindh province rose to 17.

Sindh now has two locally transmitted cases of COVID-19.

As part of precautionary measures, the Sindh government has closed all educational institutions till May 30.

The federal government, a day earlier, decided to adopt a number of precautionary measures to contain the spread of novel coronavirus including sealing the country's western border with Iran and Afghanistan and cancelling the Pakistan Day parade scheduled for March 23.

The closure of the two borders will begin on March 16 "for an initial period of two weeks in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19, in the best interest of all three brotherly countries", the Ministry of Interior said in a letter on Friday.

The decision was taken by the country's top civil and military leadership at a meeting of the National Security Committee (NSC), presided over Prime Minister Imran Khan in Islamabad on Friday.