On Friday, the Ministry of Public Health reported 631 new positive cases of COVID-19 out of 3,156 samples tested in the last 24 hours.

The ministry also reported 31 deaths and 822 recoveries from COVID-19 in the same period.

The new cases were reported in Kabul (60), Herat (151), Kandahar (9), Balkh (9), Nangarhar (32), Kunduz (10), Takhar (25), Baghlan (19), Maidan Wardak (31), Helmand (24), Parwan (16), Bamiyan (1), Badakhshan (11), Daikundi (18), Paktia (18), Kunar (18), Logar (9), Laghman (9), Panjshir (6), Farah (6), Badghis (31), Khost (28), Paktika (81) and Samangan (9) provinces.

The deaths were reported in Kabul (7), Herat (2), Balkh (1), Kandahar (6), Nangarhar (4), Takhar (1), Daikundi (1), Paktia (4), Logar (1), Farah (1), Khost (2) and Paktika (1) provinces. 

Data by the ministry shows that the total number of cases is 147,151 and total deaths stand at 6,708. 

The ministry said the positivity rate for COVID-19 is 19.99%.

This comes as the Public Health Ministry later this week started a campaign to vaccinate university students against COVID-19 before they begin their lessons in the next 10 days. Higher education institutes were reopened earlier this week, but public universities will reopen within the next 10 days after all students are vaccinated against the virus, the ministry said.

According to Johns Hopkins University, the total confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the world stands at 196,743,788 and total deaths are at 4,201,812.