North Korean authorities have announced that “six additional deaths due to fever have been reported” days after the country acknowledged the Corona virus outbreak in it.

And the official North Korean news agency reported that the army “urgently deployed its units to all pharmacies in Pyongyang and began to provide them with medicines.” Pointing out that “the number of people infected with this fever, as of Monday evening, reached more than 1483 thousand 60 people, of which 56 died, and 663 thousand 910 people continue to receive treatment.”

The outcome was recorded despite leader Kim Jong-un ordering a nationwide lockdown in an attempt to slow the spread of the virus in a country whose population has not been vaccinated.

Kim sharply criticized the country’s health authorities for what he saw as “a failure on their part to respond to the pandemic, especially the failure of pharmacies to operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week to distribute medicines to the public.”

And the official news agency said that “urgent measures have been taken to immediately eliminate deviations in the supply of medicines, including ensuring the round-the-clock operation of pharmacies in the capital.”

According to a study by Johns Hopkins University in the US, North Korea’s health care system lacks essential medicines and essential equipment according to experts and is “one of the worst in the world, ranking 193 out of 195”.