The Covid-19 tally of Nepal reached 516 on Friday evening after the confirmation of nine new cases at 8:15 pm.

“Samples of Six men aged 22 to 45 from Bara, a 54-year-old woman from Makwanpur, a 42-year-old woman from Bhaktapur and a 35-year-old man from Saptari tested positive for the coronavirus,” said the Health Ministry in a statement.

Earlier in the day the ministry had confirmed 20 new cases in the evening along with 30 cases in the morning.

On Thursday, Nepal had reported 30 new cases and its third Covid-19 death.

A 41-year-old man of Madane Rural Municipality-6 of Gulmi who had tested positive for the virus on Monday, died on Thursday morning. He was admitted to Crimson Hospital in Rupandehi.

According to the Health Ministry, the virus has already spread to 40 districts of the country.

With the authorities expanding testing, more cases are being reported from across the country.

The government has anticipated an exponential rise in Covid-19 cases throughout the country—1,000 within a week and around 2,000 in 10 days.

Banke has so far reported 115 cases, the highest in the country. The number of cases in Parsa district is 91. Sixty-nine cases have been reported in Kapilvastu, 35 in Jhapa, 33 in Udayapur, along with 29 cases in Rupandehi.

Rautahat has reported 22 cases while Sarlahi has reported 20 cases with 10 cases each from Kathmandu and Bara. Nine cases have been reported in Dhanusa.

Seven cases have now been reported from Dhankuta and Kailali.

Similarly, Chitwan, Morang, Dang and Nawalparasi (West) have reported five cases each while Bhaktapur has reported four cases, with three cases each from Sunsari, Dhading, Makwanpur, Nawalparasi (East) and Mahottari. Baglung, Bardiya and Saptari have reported two cases each.

Similarly, Khotang, Dailekh, Ramechhap, Lalitpur, Sindhuli, Lamjung, Gulmi, Bhojpur, Siraha, Kanchanpur, Kavre, Sindhupalchok, Baitadi and Dadheldhura have reported one Covid-19 case each.

“Twenty-one patients were discharged from the isolation facility at Sushil Koirala Cancer Hospital in Banke on Friday, which takes the total number of discharged patients to 70,” said Dr Bikas Devkota, the spokesperson for the Health Ministry, at a regular press briefing on Friday evening. However, three patients have been readmitted into isolation after they retested positive for the coronavirus.

“42,488 Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) tests and 82,116 Rapid Diagnostic Tests (RDTs) have been carried out across the country till Friday evening,” said Devkota. “Out of which, 3,819 PCR tests and 3,421 RDTs were performed in the last 24 hours.”

Out of the 516 cases detected so far, 440 are men and 76 women.