Bangladesh has registered eight more fatalities from COVID-19 over a 24-hour period, taking the body count to 214.

The number of officially confirmed coronavirus cases rose by 636 to 13,770 in the 24 hours to Saturday morning.

Prof Dr Nasima Sultana, Additional Director General of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), disclosed the information in the daily online health bulletin, held at the Management Information System (MIS) on Saturday afternoon.

In the last 24 hours, several coronavirus testing laboratories across the country, tested 5,465 samples, she added.

Some 313 more coronavirus infected patients were released from various hospitals after making full recovery from the extremely infectious disease in the past 24 hours, she said, adding that a total of 2,414 have returned to their homes after full recovery from different hospitals.

Earlier on April 16, Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) declared the entire country as ‘vulnerable zone’ to virus infection.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh government extended the general holidays until May 15 to contain the spread of highly infectious virus.

Bangladesh confirmed its first coronavirus cases on March 8 and the first death on March 18.