LAHORE: With 1,365 fresh cases across the province in the last 24 hours, Punjab has so far reported 68,308 coronavirus cases. As per the government's Covid-19 portal, after 60 more deaths due to coronavirus, the total number of fatalities in the province has reached to 1495.

About 435,187 tests of coronavirus have so far been conducted across the province with 8318 tests conducted during the last 24 hours.

The total number of Covid-19 cases in the provincial metropolis of Lahore has reached to about 34,820 with 580 deaths so far. In Rawalpindi, around 5,584 corona cases have been reported so far with 283 deaths. In Faisalabad, about 4,613 Covid-19 cases have so far been reported with 144 deaths.

In different hospitals of the provincial metropolis, about 800 coronavirus patients are under treatment out of which around 120 are on ventilators, sources claimed.

Health professionals urged the people to wear masks, maintain social distancing and also take other precautions to check spread of coronavirus. They also called for adopting a strict policy of lockdown to check the spread of virus on Eid-ul-Azha.

Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid, while distributing appreciation certificates among doctors of the Services Institute of Medical Sciences (SIMS) said that Pakistan is passing through a difficult phase.

Dr Yasmin said that doctors are serving patients of novel coronavirus without caring for their own lives. She called for unity and said that war against coronavirus can only be won as a nation.

On the other hand, as many as 33 localities across the province including eight areas of Lahore are being lockdown under smart lockdown policy.

The sources claimed that 96,229 houses and 1.69 million population will be put under lockdown in all blocks of Gulberg (I, II, III), Defence Housing Authority (DHA), Faisal Town, Garden Town and interior Lahore Walled City. In these localities, about 3,613 Covid-19 cases have been reported, the sources added.