Pedestrians wearing face masks walk on a street in Ankara, Turkey, on May 17, 2021. Turkey again brought COVID-19 infection "under control to a great extent" after lockdowns and restrictions during the holy month of Ramadan, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday. Turkey had imposed a 17-day lockdown since April 29 and the government on Monday launched a gradual easing period in measures until June 1. (Photo by Mustafa Kaya/Xinhua)
ANKARA, May 17 (Xinhua) -- Turkey again brought COVID-19 infection "under control to a great extent" after lockdowns and restrictions during the holy month of Ramadan, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday.
"We are speeding up vaccination activities as much as the supply program allows. I hope that such comprehensive measures will not be needed from now on," he said at a press conference after the cabinet meeting.
Turkey had imposed a 17-day lockdown since April 29 and the government on Monday launched a gradual easing period in measures until June 1.
Turkey on Monday confirmed 10,174 new COVID-19 cases, including 923 symptomatic patients, raising the total number of cases in the country to 5,127,548, according to its health ministry.
The death toll from the virus in Turkey rose by 223 to 44,983, while the total recoveries climbed to 4,961,120 after 13,864 more people recovered in the last 24 hours.
The rate of pneumonia in COVID-19 patients stands at 3.2 percent and the number of seriously ill patients is 2,326 in the country, said the ministry.
A total of 206,836 tests were conducted over the past day, with the overall number of tests in Turkey reaching 51,076,732.
Turkey started mass COVID-19 vaccination on Jan. 14 after the authorities approved the emergency use of the Chinese CoronaVac vaccine. More than 15,043,000 people have been vaccinated so far. Enditem
