Turkey announced 1,243 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, 31 more than yesterday, bringing the total number of cases to 245,635, according to a chart posted on Twitter by Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.
The COVID-19 death toll, meanwhile, increased by 21 to 5,912 in the last 24 hours, the chart indicated.
“The number of new cases is continuing to increase,” Koca tweeted.
“There is an infected person who got the disease after paying a visit to a friend with COVID-19 to say ‘Get well soon.’ If he hadn’t visited, there would be two fewer cases today because he also infected another person. It’s not difficult to fight COVID-19; we just need to follow the rules,” Koca said in another tweet.
Beginning three weeks ago, the health ministry chart no longer showed the number of intensive care patients and those on ventilators but instead reported the number of patients in critical condition and the percentage of patients among all cases who have developed pneumonia due to the coronavirus.
Today’s chart indicated that the number of patients in critical condition increased by 15 to 647, 7.9 percent of whom have developed pneumonia.
Since COVID-19 is a respiratory disease, in severe cases it causes pneumonia. According to experts, some 15 percent of coronavirus cases are severe, and nearly 5 percent of patients need ventilators to breathe.
Meanwhile, 968 more people were declared to have recovered on Thursday, bringing the total number of recoveries to 228,057.
Turkey has conducted 5,521,880 tests so far, with 66,892 more in the last 24 hours.
On average, the country conducts some 65,000 tests per 1 million of population, while the figure for the developed countries is over 100,000. Turkey reported its first COVID-19 case on March 11.
The country eased preventative measures at the start of June, opening shopping malls, cafes, restaurants and mosques.