BAGHDAD, July 9 (Xinhua) -- The Iraqi parliamentary health crisis committee said on Thursday that it has called on the government to provide logistic support to the Health Ministry to contain the recent increase in COVID-19 infections in Iraq.
"It's vital to activate new protocol treatments and improve the performance of the health institutions and the preventive measures to protect the citizens," Falih al-Ziyadi, spokesman of the parliamentary committee, said in a statement.
"We (the crisis committee) have met with Iraqi prime minister and health minister and made it clear to them that ... the imposition of a two-week full curfew is the best way to contain the high number of infections," he added.
"To apply this, it's necessary for the security forces to implement a strict curfew by sending joint committees from the interior and defense ministries to the provinces across the country," al-Ziyadi added.
Al-Ziyadi's comments came as Iraqi Health Ministry recorded 2,170 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number of infections nationwide to 69,612.
The new cases included 638 in the capital Baghdad, 208 in Sulaimaniyah, 145 in Qadisiyah, 141 in Karbala, 137 in Wasit and 131 in Basra, while the other cases were detected in the other provinces, the ministry said in a statement.
The ministry also confirmed 103 more deaths, raising the death toll to 2,882 in the country.
It added that 1,623 people recovered during the day, bringing the total recoveries from the disease to 39,502.
The new cases were recorded after 11,809 testing kits were used across the country during the past 24 hours, and a total of 649,036 tests have been carried out since the outbreak of the disease, said the statement.
China has been helping Iraq fight the COVID-19 pandemic.
From March 7 to April 26, a Chinese team of seven medical experts spent 50 days in Iraq to help contain the disease, during which they helped build a PCR lab and an advanced CT scanner in Baghdad.
Since March 7, China has also sent three batches of medical aid to Iraq. Enditem
