Iraq closer to peak stage of COVID-19 pandemic: Minister

Baghdad: Iraqi Health Minister Hassan al-Tamimi said on Monday that the country is nearing the peak stage of COVID-19 infections.
"The past few days have witnessed an unprecedented increase in the number of infections, indicating that the epidemiological situation is nearing the peak stage of the pandemic," al-Tamimi said in a statement.
The minister noted that the ministry is exerting every effort to contain the increasing number of infections, and it is seeking to prepare a makeshift hospitals with a capacity of 400 beds in the Iraqi provinces as soon as possible.
He said that Iraq's death rate from COVID-19 is 3.5 per cent, and the recovery rate is 45 per cent.
On the same day, Iraqi Health Ministry reported 1,808 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total number of infections to 32,676.
It also reported 67 deaths during the day, raising the death toll to 1,167 in the country, while 14,785 patients have recovered.
The new cases were recorded after 10,075 testing kits were used across the country during the past 24 hours, and a total of 455,316 tests have been carried out since the outbreak of the disease, the statement added.
The continuous increase of COVID-19 cases pushed some Iraqi provinces to reimpose a full curfew, including Basra province and Maysan in southern Iraq.
A statement by Asaad al-Edani, Basra's governor, said that the provincial authorities imposed a week-long full curfew from Tuesday until July 1 to contain the increase of COVID-19 cases.
Meanwhile, Iraqi Parliament Speaker Mohammed al-Halbousi said in an interview with local Dijla TV channel that 20 lawmakers and 28 of the parliament employees have been infected with the virus, including a director general.
Iraqi Civil Aviation Authority said in a statement that it has extended the ban on the domestic and foreign flights until July 1.
Flights for Iraqi citizens returning from abroad, emergency and air cargo, as well as planes that cross Iraqi airspace will continue as normal.