Turkey confirms 40,596 new COVID-19 cases

ANKARA -- Turkey on Saturday reported 40,596 new COVID-19 cases, including 2,905 symptomatic patients, as the total number of positive cases in the country reached 4,591,416, according to its health ministry.

The death toll from the virus in Turkey rose by 339 to 38,011, while the total recoveries climbed to 4,022,408 after 52,297 more cases recovered in the last 24 hours.

The rate of pneumonia in COVID-19 patients stands at 2.9 percent and the number of seriously ill patients is 3,511 in the country, said the ministry.

A total of 281,183 tests were conducted over the past day, with the overall number of tests in Turkey reaching 45,623,978.

Turkey started mass vaccination for COVID-19 on Jan. 14 after the authorities approved the emergency use of the Chinese Sinovac vaccine. More than 13,116,000 people have been vaccinated so far.

Turkey reported its first COVID-19 case on March 11, 2020.