The Ministry of Health (Minsa) reported that for this Friday, October 16, in Panama there are 17 new deaths due to COVID-19, raising the total number of deaths to 2,546, with a case fatality rate of 2.1%.
The Health Ministry details that for today the country reached 123,498 accumulated cases of coronavirus, after registering a total of 615 new infections in the last 24 hours.
Regarding hospitalizations, a total of 662 patients currently remain in the ward, while 116 are in intensive care units.
Minsa points out that to date 99,286 recovered people and 21,666 cases that remain active are reported, of which 20,407 are in hospital hotels and 481 remain in isolation at home.
In the last 24 hours, 6,472 new tests have been carried out to detect COVID-19 and the positivity rate is 9.5%.
NOTE:
Some critics have argued that the Minsa reported case fatality rate (number of COVID linked deaths / number of known cases) in reality could 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 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.