The Ministry of Health (Minsa) of Panama reported 16 new deaths with covid-19 in the last 24 hours, bringing the total number of deaths from the virus to 3,002, and a case fatality rate of 1.9%.
Meanwhile, 1,602 new cases were reported, for a cumulative total of 158,532.
9,978 tests were applied to detect covid-19 in the last hours, for a positivity of 16.1%.
There are 16,174 active cases and 139,356 recovered patients.
Of the total active cases, 15,134 patients are in home isolation, of them 14,454 are at home and 680 in hospital hotels.
While 1,040 patients are hospitalized, 889 in the ward and 151 in intensive care units.
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.
There have also been reports on the inaccuracy of the PCR test, which would highly compromise any figures mentioned above.
In lack of better information sources, PanaTimes continues to report the government (Minsa) announced figures. Readers are adviced to use their own judgement.