Jakarta. The number of recovered Covid-19 patients grew above the reported daily new cases in Indonesia for a second day in a row on Friday. Only in four occasions has the country experienced such a fate since the outbreak.

The National Covid-19 Task Force said 1,781 Covid-19 patients have been cured or discharged from hospitals in the last 24 hours, while new confirmed cases of the virus increased by 1,761.

The country now has a total of 95,418 cases, of which 56.5 percent have recovered. The figure includes 4,665 deaths, 89 more from yesterday.

Wiku Adisasmito, who leads a team of experts with the task force, said the percentage of recovered patients against the total number of cases have been increasing significantly within the recent months. 

The number of cured patients represented only 8.33 percent of confirmed cases in March, but it grew to 15.04 percent in April, climbed to 27.61 percent in May and went even higher to 43.99 percent in June, Wiku said. 

As of July 23, the number of recovered Covid-19 patients accounted for 55.70 percent of the total cases.

Daily recoveries outnumbered new cases for the first time last week, 1,489 against 1,462. It happened again on July 19, when the daily number of cured patients hit a record 2,133 while only 1,639 new cases were reported.

The daily recoveries reached the second highest rise yesterday, with 1,909 recovered patients, three more than the total number of new cases.

The overall number of recoveries has beaten active cases since July 13.

Surge in East Java

East Java saw resurgence in new infections on Friday, adding 496 new cases to take its total to 19,946 and ending Jakarta’s six-day run as the province with the most daily cases.

It also reported 29 more deaths, taking the province’s total death toll to 1,554.

Jakarta added 297 new cases for a total of 18,365, including 755 deaths.

Central Java reported the highest daily death toll for the third day in a row, with 38 Covid-19 deaths in the last 24 hours to take its total death toll to 544.

It recorded 124 new cases, bringing its total number of cases to 8,145.

Apart from the three provinces on the most densely populated island of Java, no province reported three-digit figure in the day.

South Sulawesi, the third most-affected province, registered 85 new cases for a total of 8,612. The current trend means that it will be surpassed by central Java before the end of this month.

Covid-19 cases in Bali topped 3,000 on Friday after it registered 62 new cases.

Overall, the country must deal with 36,808 active cases. West Kalimantan is the only province who has no active cases as of Friday. It has reported 359 cases overall, with 355 recoveries and four deaths.