ISLAMABAD — Pakistan’s COVID-19 caseload has reached 248,872 with 2,521 new patients in the last 24 hours, while the death toll climbed to 5,197, the health ministry said on Sunday.

The Ministry of National Health Services said that the coronavirus recoveries were increasing in the country as about 63 percent of the total infected patients have recovered so far.

It said that the number of recovered people reached 156,700.

The ministry said that 2,521 new cases surfaced during the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 248,872.

Maximum 103,836 cases were detected in Sindh, 86,556 in Punjab, 30,078 in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 14,023 in Islamabad, 11,157 in Balochistan, 1,658 in Gilgit-Baltistan and 1,564 in Azad Kashmir.

The death toll reached 5,197 after 74 more coronavirus patients died. Another 2,118 were in critical condition.

So far a total of 1,562,638 tests were conducted across the country, including 24,211 in the last 24 hours.

Official data showed that the number of new cases has come down after reaching a maximum of 6,825 cases in a day recorded on June 13. For the last many days, the daily cases are less than 3,000.

According to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the contagion has infected over 12.7 million people and killed more than 565,000 across the world. — Agencies