Panama registered 1,408 new cases of covid-19 and 20 deaths due to this disease in the last hours, raising the total number of infections to 316,808 and the number of deaths to 5,196, the Ministry of Health (Minsa) reported.
The fatality rate is at 1.6%.
In the last 24 hours, 11,030 tests were applied to detect covid-19 – 12.7% were positive.
According to the epidemiological report of the Minsa, there are currently 41,975 active cases and 269,637 people recovered.
There are 39,308 confined patients, of them 38,825 are in their residences and 483 in hospital hotels.
While 2,667 are hospitalized, of them 2,424 in ward and 243 in intensive care units.
NOTE:
Some observers 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, the method used in Panama to define 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 compromise the figures mentioned above.
In lack of better information sources, PanaTimes continues to publish reports with the government (Minsa) announced figures. Readers are adviced to use their own judgement. We are happy to publish more accurate reports, if they become available to us or our contributors.