Turkey's new coronavirus figures confirm experts' worst fears

Municipality workers disinfect the grounds of the historical Suleymaniye Mosque in Istanbul, due to coronavirus outbreak. Pic/AP

When Turkey changed the way it reports daily COVID-19 infections, it confirmed what medical groups and opposition parties have long suspected - that the country is faced with an alarming surge of cases that is fast exhausting the Turkish health system.

In an about-face, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government this week resumed reporting all positive coronavirus tests - not just the number of patients being treated for symptoms - pushing the number of daily cases to above 30,000. With the new data, the country jumped from being one of the least-affected nations in Europe to one of the worst-hit.

That came as no surprise to the Turkish Medical Association, which has been warning for months that the government's previous figures were concealing the graveness of the spread and that the lack of transparency was contributing to the surge. The group maintains, however, that the ministry's figures are still low compared with its estimate of at least 50,000 new cases per day.

The country's hospitals are overstretched, medical staff are burned out and contract tracers, who were once credited for keeping the outbreak under check, are struggling to track transmissions, Sebnem Korur Fincanci, who heads the association, told The AP. Ebru Kiraner, who heads the Istanbul-based Intensive Care Nurses' Association, says intensive care unit beds in Istanbul's hospitals are almost full, with doctors scrambling to find room for critically ill patients.

N Korea toughens rules of entry to sea

North Korea is further toughening restrictions on entering seawaters as part of elevated steps to fight the pandemic, state media said on Sunday, two days after South Korea said the North had banned sea fishing. The Korean Central News Agency reported the country is mobilising more anti-virus units and establishing strong steps to "completely remove uncivilised and unhygienic elements that could help make room for the spread of an epidemic" at winter.

Cambodia tracks contacts after family infected

Cambodian officials say a family of six and another man tested positive for the coronavirus in a rare case of local infection, and Prime Minister Hun Sen expressed concern that the woman believed to be the source had travelled extensively in the country. The woman had travelled between Siam Reap and Phnom Penh. Hun Sen also ordered the temporary shutdown of a mall, which the woman visited.

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