Thailand reports record Covid deaths for 3 days

Bangkok, July 2 Thailand on Friday reported record-high daily Covid-19 deaths for the third day in a row, 61 new fatalities, as the Southeast Asian country struggled to contain its worst wave of the pandemic so far.

The country's death toll has risen to 2,141, soaring from less than 100 at the beginning of April when the latest outbreak started to spread, according to the Centre for the Covid-19 Situation Administration (CCSA).

The CCSA also reported 6,087 new cases, the second-highest daily tally since the pandemic began, raising the total number of infections to 270,921, reports Xinhua news agency.

The capital Bangkok, epicentre of the pandemic, still has the highest number of new cases, with a record of 2,267 cases being detected during the past 24 hours, according to the CCSA.

The country is experiencing increasing cases of Delta variant, which is easily transmissible and likely to affect risk groups more severely, CCSA spokesperson Apisamai Srirangsan said at a daily briefing.

Apisamai said the government is applying community isolation measures amid an inadequacy of hospital beds and rising infections, especially in Bangkok.

For infected people with slight symptoms or no symptoms, they would be isolated within the communities, and those who develop medium symptoms would be transferred out of the communities to hospitals or field hospitals, according to Apisamai.

Till date Thailand has administered more than 10 million doses of vaccines since it launched the inoculation program in February, with 3.97 per cent of its people having fully vaccinated, according to the CCSA.