Turkey's Health Ministry releases COVID-19 breakdown by patient region, age, gender for the first time

Duvar English

Turkey's Health Ministry has for the first time released a breakdown of COVID-19 cases by region, age and gender in a report.

According to the report released on July 2, during the period of March 11 – June 28, some 198,284 laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 cases and 5,097 deaths due to the virus have been reported in Turkey.

“Totalnumber of hospitalizations was 105,416 and 5,773 patient werehospitalized between June 22-28,” the report said. “Recovery rateand death rate of all confirmed cases were 86.04 percent and 2.57percent respectively.”

Istanbul has registered over half of the cases, with 108,749 patients during this period. Health Minister Fahrettin Koca had said on July 1 that Istanbul accounts for nearly 54 percent of the total virus cases in the country.

Issued both in English and Turkish, the report said that of all reported cases 48 percent were female and 52 percent were male. Among all those notified cases, 7.3 percent were children under 15 years of age, 13.77 percent were in the 15-24 age group, 49.4 percent were in the 25-49 age group, 18.5 percent were in the 50-64 age group, 18.4 percent were in the 65-79 age group and 2.6 percent were aged 80 years or older.

Death rate of all confirmed cases was 2.57 percent, according to the report. The lowest death rate was 0.03 percent for aged 15-24 while the highest death rate was 26.94 percent for patients aged 80 and older.

Turkey registers 1,186 new infections, 17 new fatalities from the virus

The report came as Turkey registered 1,186 new infections and 17 new fatalities on July 2. The nationwide cases reached 202,284 whereas the death toll from the virus rose to 5,167, according to the Health Ministry data.

MinisterKoca wrote on Twitter that Istanbul, Ankara, Gaziantep, Konya andBursa were the top provinces with the highest number cases, whereasBurdur and Gümüşhane have not reported any cases in the last twodays.

Koca also said that media outlets on July 2 covered various news of social distancing measures having been flouted by passengers on public transportation. The minister has been for days urging the nation to comply with the virus measures saying the claims that the virus had weakened do not reflect the truth.

At the start of June, Turkey opened restaurants and cafes, and lifted weekend stay-home orders and inter-city travel bans. A subsequent doubling of daily coronavirus cases prompted President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to warn the country had lost some ground in its battle with coronavirus.

As Turks poured out into streets, parks, malls and vacation spots last month, Ankara made face masks compulsory in major provinces. More measures could come even as officials have said there is no plan to slow momentum in the economy, which emerged in June from a near standstill since mid-March.

The country allowed wedding halls, along with theaters and internet cafes, to open again from July 1 as it wound down some of its last major coronavirus curbs.

New rules mean guests' temperatures are taken and sanitizers are used upon arrival. Tables are separated and everyone - including the bride and groom - must wear masks.