Yangon – Myanmar’s COVID-19 cases have exceeded 20,000 after reporting about 10,000 cases in the last nine days, the Ministry of Health and Sports said on Tuesday.
Around 1,000 new cases have been reported per day since Sept. 29, when Myanmar started using antigen test kits and increasing daily tests from 5,000 tests per day to more than 8,000.
Myanmar hit 10,000 COVID-19 cases on Sept. 27.
On Tuesday alone, the authorities said they conducted 10,074 COVID-19 tests, detecting 1,252 coronavirus cases.
As of Wednesday morning, Myanmar reported 20,033 COVID-19 cases, including 471 deaths and 5,782 recoveries.
Myanmar has been experiencing a sharp rise of COVID-19 cases since Aug. 16, when the first domestic transmission in a month was detected in the Rakhine State capital, Sittwe.
Between Aug. 16 and Oct. 6, Myanmar reported 19,659 COVID-19 cases, compared with 374 cases and six deaths from March 23 to Aug. 16.
The health ministry said cases have been reported in 205 townships across the 14 regions and states with only Kayah State reporting no coronavirus cases.
The country’s COVID-19 hotspot, Yangon, reported more than 14,900 cases on Oct. 6, followed by Rakhine State with more than 1,600 cases.
Around 30 to 40 COVID-19 deaths are currently being reported per day in Myanmar.
The country reported 41 deaths on Sunday, 32 deaths on Monday and 27 deaths on Tuesday.
Among Asean members, Myanmar is fourth in terms of COVID-19 cases, behind the Philippines with more than 327,000 cases, Indonesia with more than 311,000 cases and Singapore with more than 57,830 cases.
In Asean, Myanmar is third in terms of COVID-19 deaths, behind Indonesia with more than 11,374 deaths and the Philippines with more than 5,865 deaths.
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