Maldives reports lowest daily increase in Covid-19 cases in months

Maldives on Saturday reported the lowest daily rise in Covid-19 cases, in months.

14 new infections were reported on Saturday, and were confirmed from the 1,816 samples tested within 24 hours.

Eight of the cases were detected from the capital region. Three were confirmed from operational resorts, two from outlying islands and one from an island under development.

While this pushes the country’s Covid-19 case count to 12,947, there are currently 1,113 active cases. 812 of the active cases are in the capital area, 21 in outlying atolls, 82 in tourist establishments, 197 in islands under development and one in an industrial island.

With an additional 32 recoveries reported, a total of 11,781 patients have recovered from the virus. There have been 46 deaths.

92 patients are receiving treatment at hospitals, one less than the previous day.

Out of the 12,947 cases confirmed since March, 62.7 percent are Maldivians. 25.1 percent of the confirmed infections are Bangladeshi nationals.

While Saturday saw the lowest daily increase in cases in months, there was a slight increase in daily cases last week with 150 new infections reported on November 23. Health officials had expressed concern over the increase in cases confirmed from flu clinics, and urged the public to continue to follow Covid-19 safety rules.

Maldives' first Covid-19 cases were confirmed from a resort in March, and a community transmission was confirmed on April 15. This led to a complete lockdown in the capital, as well as a partial lockdown across the country with travel between islands banned.

The travel ban was part of the efforts to ensure the virus does not spread among island communities, and while people are now allowed to travel to islands, there is a mandatory 14-day quarantine period after traveling from the capital.

The Covid-19 Technical Advisory Group (TAG) recently announced that they have no plans to ease this order.