Pakistan has posted another 67 coronavirus infections and a single fatality during the last 24 hours (Friday) with infectivity ratio slipping to 0.40 percent, showed the statistics released by the National Institute of Health (NIH) on Saturday morning, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.

According to NIH data, the death toll in the country edged up to 30,612 while the number of total infections now stood at 1,572,269 after adding the fresh 67 cases.

During the last 24 hours (Friday), 16,791 tests were conducted throughout Pakistan whereas the positivity ratio stood at 0.40 percent. The number of patients in critical care was recorded at 75.

https://twitter.com/NIH_Pakistan/status/1573504621536059402

During the last 24 hours (Friday), another 97 patients have recovered from the Covid-19 in Pakistan and the number of total recoveries now stood at 1,536,831. As of Saturday, the total count of active cases in the country was recorded at 4,826.

As many as 594,216 coronavirus cases have so far been confirmed in Sindh, 522,096 in Punjab, 224,195 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 139,397 in Islamabad, 35,994 in Balochistan, 44,315 in Azad Kashmir and 12,056 in Gilgit-Baltistan.

As many as 13,613 individuals have lost their lives to the pandemic in Punjab so far, 8,240 in Sindh, 6,366 in KP, 1,031 in Islamabad, 793 in Azad Kashmir, 378 in Balochistan and 191 in Gilgit Baltistan.

Covid infections rise in England and Wales

The number of people testing positive for Covid-19 has gone up in England and Wales for the first time in two months, official statistics showed on Friday.

The results are based on data for the week ending September 14 from the government's Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Based on its data, the ONS estimated that the number of people testing positive in England was 766,500 -- amounting to approximately one in 70 people -- and in Wales 39,700, or one in 75.

The previous week's survey found infection rates were one in 75 in England and one in 110 in Wales.

According to the long-running survey, both these UK countries last saw a week-on-week increase in the week ending July 6, fuelled by the new Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 variants.

At the same time, figures for Scotland and Northern Ireland went down.

The results come from a survey in which a random sample of the population is swabbed -- whether or not they have symptoms.

Those tested do not include people living in care homes.

Researchers then model these results to estimate how many of the total population is currently infected.

Two Omicron subvariants, BA.4 and B.A5, have partly driven a wave of new cases of the disease in Europe and the United States.

With inputs from AFP.