ISLAMABAD, July 8 (Xinhua) -- The Pakistani government has imposed smart lockdown at 227 places in 30 cities across the country that were acting as hotspots of COVID-19, the Prime Minister Office said Wednesday.
The country's Prime Minister Imran Khan chaired a meeting to review the current situation of COVID-19 and policies to contain it, during which he was briefed that smart lockdown is proving very useful to bring down the number of new cases in the country, a statement released by the office said.
The meeting discussed how strict lockdown in the country had to be lifted by keeping in view the economic condition of the country and how the government's policy to impose smart lockdown is proving helpful.
The prime minister was also briefed by the health ministry officials that with a decline in new cases, the excessive load on the hospitals has been controlled due to which healthcare system saw an improvement.
"1,500 beds have been provided to hospitals for critical COVID-19 patients and in the coming days, 1,000 more beds will be provided to further facilitate the infected patients," the statement added.
The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases has risen to 237,489 in Pakistan with 4,922 fatalities while 140,965 people have recovered from the disease across the country, according to the data released by the health ministry on Wednesday. Enditem
