Pakistani PM Imran Khan tests positive for coronavirus
20 March 2021, 11:44
The former cricketer has quarantined himself at home.
Pakistan’s prime minister Imran Khan has tested positive for the coronavirus, two days after he received his first vaccine dose.
Dr Faisal Sultan, Mr Khan’s special assistant on health, said the prime minister has quarantined himself at his private home on a hilltop in the Islamabad suburbs.
There has been a spike in Covid-19 in the capital and in eastern and northern Pakistan, where authorities have reported 42 new deaths and 3,876 new cases of the coronavirus during past 24 hours across the country.
This takes the total deaths to 13,799, with more than 623,000 people having been infected so far.
Since February, Pakistan has been using a Covid-19 vaccine donated by neighbouring China. Health workers have been vaccinated and now older people are receiving the jab.
Media reports say a private Pakistani pharmaceutical company has imported 50,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, but it is unclear what the price of the vaccine will be.
