One death and 198 new Covid-19 cases — 180 local infections and 18 arrivals — were reported on Saturday, bringing the totals to 72 fatalities and 13,302 cases.
An 81-year-old man, whose family member was infected after he had been to Samut Sakhon province on Dec 31, died on Friday, Dr Panprapa Yongtrakul, assistant spokesperson of the Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration, said on Saturday.
He had medical conditions — diabetes, chronic kidney failure and ischemic heart disease.
On Jan 2, the man sought treatment at a hospital in Phichit after he had a fever, a cough, phlegm and diarrhea. He tested positive the next day.
On Jan 4, he became more exhausted. A lung X-ray showed he had severe lung infection and he was intubated. On Jan 9, his condition improved and doctors removed the tube, but he still relied on oxygen to breathe. On Jan 15, he had a fever and a cough and was put back on the ventilator. His condition worsened and was pronounced dead around 10.30pm on Jan 22, said Dr Panprapa.
Of the 198 new infections, 180 were local infections and 18 were arrivals in quarantine.
Phichit governor Rangsan Tancharoen said separately that the man contracted the virus from his son who returned from Samut Sakhon province. The elderly man was the first Covid-19 death in the province.
Phichit had nine Covid-19 cases, all linked to Samut Sakhon province. Despite strict preventive measures, new infections were found over the past 20 days, said the governor.
The 69 cases in the first group were found in Samut Sakhon (56), Bangkok (5), Samut Songkram (5), and one each from Ang Thong, Samut Prakan and Rayong.
The second group of 111 people were detected during active finding in Samut Sakhon (107) and Bangkok (4).
The 18 infected arrivals were Thais (12), Americans (3), Italian (1), Egyptian (1) and Russian (1). They arrived from the United Kingdom (5), Bahrain (4), the United Arab Emirate (2) and one each from Sweden, India, Italy, Egypt, Russia, the US and Switzerland.
Of the 13,302 confirmed cases to date, 10,448 ( 78.5%) have recovered, including 224 discharged from hospitals over the past 24 hours, and 2,782 remained in hospitals. The death toll stood at 72, said the CCSA.
Global Covid-19 cases rose by 652,952 over the previous 24 hours to 98.74 million. The worldwide death toll soared by 15,953 to 2.11 million.
The US had the most cases at 25.39 million, up 192,065. India came second with 10.64 million, up 14,344. Thailand ranked 128th.
