People wear face masks outside a market in Karachi, Pakistan. (File photo: Reuters)
Pakistan recorded more than 100 deaths in a single day from COVID-19 for the first time since keeping statistics in mid-March, when the country first imposed a lock down that has never been total.
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As of Tuesday, Pakistan recorded 108,316 coronavirus infections, with 4,646 new cases and a death toll that has climbed to 2,172 amid warnings from Prime Minister Imran Khan that Pakistan is not likely to see a peak in infections before August.
Despite criticism from medical professionals and opposition politicians, Khan has continued to ease lockdown restrictions saying the country’s ailing economy would collapse and the poorest among the country’s 220 million would suffer the most for prolonged lockdowns.
Pakistan’s poverty level hovers around 30 percent, measured as those who earn $1.90 a day or less.
Pakistanis have also been stubbornly refusing to take precautions like wearing masks and social distancing even as Khan went on television late on Monday to reprimand the population and plead with them to wear masks.
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