Pakistan's COVID-19 crisis is only getting worse

• Pakistan records 4,950 new COVID-19 cases over last 24 hours.
• Positivity rate jumps to 8.64%.
• Sindh under a nine-day lockdown from today.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan's fight against coronavirus continues to get worse and worse every day, with the country nearing in on 5,000 daily cases Saturday morning.

According to the National Command and Operation Centre's latest numbers, 4,950 fresh infections were detected over the last 24 hours after 58,479 COVID-19 tests were conducted.

The positivity rate jumped to 8.64%.

The nationwide death toll from coronavirus now stands 23,360 after 65 people lost their lives to the disease, while the number of recovered patients stands at 940,164 and the active cases of the country are 66,287, NCOC's stats showed.

According to a province-wise breakdown, the total number of cases in Sindh has reached 380,093, 143,673 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 356,211 in Punjab, 87,304 in Islamabad, 30,289 in Balochistan, 24,145 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir and 8,096 in Gilgit-Baltistan.

Read what you can and cannot do under Sindh's current lockdown 

The Sindh government has announced a nine-day lockdown which goes into effect today.

According to the restrictions under the lockdown, government offices will be closed from next week, those who do not get vaccinated will not get their salary after August 31, vaccination cards of anyone roaming the streets will be checked, the export industry will remain open, all markets in the province will remain closed, but pharmacies will stay open and inter-city transport will be closed.