Government extends restrictions on attendance in Lahore, Rawalpindi schools

LAHORE:– Punjab government has extended its decision to restrict attendance to 50 percent in public and private schools in provincial capital and Rawalpindi.

According to the notification issued by the provincial education department, classes up to Grade 6 will be staggered in all public and private schools till February 15, 2022.

Earlier, government restricted attendance in schools from January 20 due to rising cases of the coronavirus as country battled fifth wave of the pandemic fueled by omicron variant.

On the other hand, Pakistan has reported second-highest cases of coronavirus since start of pandemic.

Pakistan has reported 27 deaths in the last 24 hours by novel coronavirus as the number of positive cases has surged to 1,410,033. The nationwide tally of fatalities has jumped to 29,219 on Saturday.

According to the latest figures by the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) 7,963 persons tested positive for COVID-19 in the past 24 hours.

Punjab remains the worst-hit province in terms of deaths followed by Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Till now 13,139 individuals have lost their lives to the epidemic in Punjab, 7,800 in Sindh 5,994 in KP, 979 in Islamabad, 752 in Azad Kashmir, 367 in Balochistan, and 188 in GB.