The Ministry of Health (Minsa) reports that for Wednesday, September 30, in Panama a total of 112,595 accumulated cases of COVID-19 are reported, of which 742 are new infections registered in the last 24 hours.
It also details that the number of confirmed deaths due to the new coronavirus rose to 2,372, after registering 8 new deaths, with which the case fatality rate in the country remains at 2.1%.
Minsa adds that for today 89,061 people have recovered and 21,162 cases remain active are reported, of which 363 are in hospital hotels and 19,995 remain in isolation at home.
A total of 688 patients are hospitalized in the ward and 116 are in the intensive care unit.
The Minsa adds that in the last hours 5,212 new tests have been carried out to detect COVID-19 and the positivity rate is 14.2%.
NOTE:
Some critics have argued that the Minsa reported case fatality rate (number of COVID linked deaths / number of known cases) in reality should be much lower, as the number of reported cases does not necessarily reflect the truth, as the testing does not cover the whole population, and many cases go undetected. At the same time, the government can't report what they don't know, but readers should note that the numbers may tell a different story from the reality.
Also, how a "COVID death" is counted is also unclear, as many of the deaths correspond to underlying previous conditions, such as cancer, blood diseases, other age related diseases etc., and are reported as COVID deaths since the patient also had the coronavirus. On the other hand, many viruses are known to lower the patient's immunity and expose them to other diseases. As an example most HIV/AIDS patients don't die from the virus itself, but from other derived diseases such as pneumonia or regular flu.
In lack of better information sources, PanaTimes continues to report the government (Minsa) announced figures. Readers are adviced to use their own judgement.