Debate rages over Turkey’s surging pandemic numbers
20% of Israeli travelers to Turkey in October tested positive for coronavirus on their return
Unofficial sources have warned that numbers of COVID-19 cases in Turkey are skyrocketing.
The Turkish Medical Association ( TTB) estimated that daily COVID-19 cases have risen to more than 47,500, of which about 12,500 are in Istanbul. This would represent a 300 percent increase in November compared to the month before.
According to official data, however, Turkey recorded 5,103 new COVID-19 patients on Nov. 20 — the second highest new
daily figure since March — and its highest daily death toll with 141 fatalities.
Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu announced that 186 people died from “infectious diseases” in the city on Nov. 22 — more than the official countrywide death toll. ( The Turkish health ministry is accused of classifying some COVID-related deaths as “infection-related deaths“)
The TTB, whose data drew on figures from 1,270 medics in 76 provinces, claimed that someone in
Turkey dies from COVID-19 every 10 minutes. It declared that “they have lost control of the pandemic.” Health Minister Fahrettin Koca previously admitted that they do not include everyone who tested positive for COVID-19 in the number of daily cases — they only count those who show symptoms.
Following this admission Turkey was put on the UK’s quarantine-onarrival list in early October. Reports drawing on Israeli health ministry data say that 20 percent of Israeli travelers to Turkey in October tested positive for coronavirus on their return home, which experts consider a worryingly high figure.
Everyone arriving in Israel is obliged to self-isolate for 14 days. There is no such an obligation in Turkey.
“The countries which prove successful in managing the pandemic are those that apply strict quarantine rules and rigorously regulate arrivals in the country. But this is not the case in Turkey nowadays,” said Guner Sonmez, a radiologist from Uskudar University in Istanbul.
“Only one case can again trigger a whole chain of contagion and begin a new wave of pandemic. However, no PCR test is required now in
Turkish airports for the passengers who enter the country. It is a very big mistake for managing the dynamics of the pandemic.”
Turkey recently re-introduced a partial evening curfew and restrictions on the weekends, although scientists have been urging a full 14-day lockdown.