COVID-19: Ghana confirms nine more deaths

19th Aug 2020 | Source: GNA

The Ghana Health Service (GHS) says nine more patients have succumbed to the COVID-19 disease, increasing the country's death toll to 248.

The nine deaths, recorded in three regions;Bono- 4; Eastern- 3 and Volta- 2, all but two had underlying health conditions, including; hypertension, heart failure, diabetes, pneumonia and asthma, among others.

Additionally, the country's active cases had risen to 1,949, from a previous 1,847 as at Monday, August 17.

Those cases, the GHS said, were being managed in treatment sites, isolation centres across the country, while some were under home management.

So far, a total of 40,796 persons had clinically recovered and discharged.

The latest update by the country's health management body via a designated website also confirmed that 340 new cases of infections had been recorded, bringing the country's total case count to 42,993.

The new infections were from tests conducted on August 16.

They were recorded in nine regions with Greater Accra recording the highest infections of 157; Ashanti- 81 and Central- 28.

Other regions included; Western- 25; Western North- 18; Eastern- 12; Bono East- 10; and Ahafo and Volta recorded five and four respectively.

Sixteen cases were considered severe with six patients in critical conditions and three on ventilators.

Out of the total confirmed cases, 16,754 were from the General Surveillance; with 26,239 cases from the Enhanced Contact Tracing, the update stated.

A total of 428,695 tests have been conducted so far.

Out of this, 156,245 were from Routine Surveillance with 272,450 from Contact Tracing.

The positivity rate is 10.0.

The latest infections took Greater Accra’s total cases to 21,369, representing almost 50 per cent of the national total.

The Ashanti, Western and Eastern regions had case tally of 10,650; 2,924 and 2,109 respectively.

The rest are:

Central- 1,829