Islamabad, Apr 22 (IANS): A lockdown is likely to be imposed in major cities of Pakistan if the resurgence of new Covid-19 cases persists due to failure of the public to comply with the standard operating procedures (SOPs) set by the government, the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) said.

Talking to the media after chairing a meeting of the NCOC, the centere's chief Asad Umar said on Wednesday that the third wave of the disease is getting serious and the number of critical patients on ventilators rose to around 4,500, about 30 per cent higher than the peak time of the pandemic in June 2020, reports Xinhua news agency.

Umar said that the public should realize that it is time to get serious about the disease spreads and comply with the SOPs because the negligence of the public is putting extra burden on the healthcare system.

He said that 80 per cent of ventilators in most of the cities of the country are being used, and the country on the whole is utilizing over 90 per cent of the total oxygen supply chain available.

The official said that the NCOC has decided to impose further restrictions which will be announced on Friday to be implemented in the country where schools and excursion activities are already banned in almost all major cities.

Sharing statistics with the media, Umar said that the Covid-19 positivity rate in some areas of the country has risen to over thirty percent, which is very alarming for the healthcare system of the country.

The official earlier said that most of the new cases in the country in the third wave are because of the coronavirus variant initially found in Britain.

In order to put a check on the fast spread of the disease, Pakistan has put 23 countries in its "Category C" list from where inbound travellers have been banned.

Pakistan has reported a total of 772,381 Covid-19 cases, 16,600 deaths and 672,619 recoveries.