Photo taken on April 7, 2020 shows the construction site of a new hospital in Istanbul, Turkey. Turkey will build two hospitals in the country's biggest city Istanbul for COVID-19 patients, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said. Each of them will have a capacity of 1,000 beds. (Photo by Ali Kaya/Xinhua)
ISTANBUL, April 6 (Xinhua) -- Turkey will build two hospitals in the country's biggest city Istanbul for COVID-19 patients, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday.
The hospitals will be constructed in the Ataturk Airport area on the European side of the city and Sancaktepe district on the Asian side, the president noted at a televised speech in Istanbul.
"Their constructions will be completed within 45 days," Erdogan said, adding that each of them will have a capacity of 1,000 beds.
The president pointed out that Turkey's health system surpassed an important threshold by implementing 20,000 COVID-19 tests per day.
Turkish Health Ministry announced that a total of 21,400 tests were conducted in a single day across the country on Monday, and 3,148 people were tested positive for the virus, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 30,217.
Turkey has recorded a total of 649 deaths as 75 more people lost their lives over the past 24 hours.
Erdogan on April 3 announced a series of strong measures to contain the coronavirus outbreak in the country, declaring a partial curfew for the citizens under the age of 20 and closing the borders of 31 out of 81 provinces across the country.
Additionally, wearing face masks became mandatory in crowded areas, including supermarkets, marketplaces and workplaces.
In his Monday's speech, Erdogan noted that local officials began distributing medical masks to citizens free of charge, adding that their sales in the market were banned.
