COVID-19: Kurdistan Region’s death toll nears 2,000; Sulaimani governor issues warning

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Kurdistan Region’s Health Ministry on Wednesday announced another 886 new COVID-19 cases along with 29 deaths in the past 24 hours, as the total death count nears 2,000.

The ministry’s daily statement said it had conducted 5,728 tests during the past 24 hours, raising the total of such tests to 503,226 since the outbreak began in the Kurdistan Region in early March.

According to the health ministry, the total number of infections in the Kurdistan Region reached 52,756 cases. Adding Wednesday’s death figures, the region now has 1,906 deaths due to the novel coronavirus.

Health officials say 33,312 coronavirus patients have recovered, but it is important to note that a patient classified as a “recovery” means they are no longer being actively treated by health professionals, not that they have fully recovered. Increasingly, medical experts recognize that COVID-19 symptoms, some of them serious, often continue long after an individual’s formal recovery and that various other symptoms could be permanent.

‘Other provinces will be like Sulaimani’

Sulaimani Governor Haval Abubakir on Wednesday warned that if the current dangerous trend of COVID-19 continues – without taking necessary actions against the virus – other province’s condition will be like Sulaimani.

“I assure other [Kurdistan Region] provinces in the upcoming two weeks, your condition [regarding COVID-19] will be like Sulaimani,” Abubakir told reporters during a press conference.

The governor’s remarks come as a day earlier, Sulaimani Health Directorate announced 15 fatalities in the 24 period in the province, warning that “Sulaimani is in a dangerous situation that has never been like this before.”

At the beginning of the pandemic, the province was the first to record the initial COVID-19 cases. Later, Sulaimani became the epicenter of the outbreak in the Kurdistan Region. As of Wednesday, the province has recorded 17,047 cases since the beginning of the pandemic along with 972 fatalities – the highest death toll.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany