Turkish national brought to homeland via air ambulance

Turkey on Tuesday repatriated one of its nationals who is suffering from the coronavirus but was unable to get treatment in Sudan. 

Mehmet Hanefi Aydin, 55, was sent home from a hospital in Sudan although he tested positive for the virus.

Aydin returned from Khartoum via an ambulance plane after his children pleaded for help on social media.

After arriving in Istanbul, he was taken to Marmara University Pendik Training and Research Hospital.

Turkey's number of ICU and ventilator patients drop, and a total of 73,285 people have recovered so far from the Covid-19 in Turkey, including 5,119 registered, the country's health minister said on Tuesday.

The death toll from the pandemic rose to 3,520 as Turkey saw 59 more deaths in the past 24 hours, Fahrettin Koca said on Twitter.

The country recorded 1,832 new cases, bringing the tally to 129,491, he added.

More than 3.64 million cases have been reported in 187 countries and regions since the virus emerged in China last December, with the US and Europe the world's hardest-hit areas.

A significant number of COVID-19 patients, nearly 1.2 million, have recovered, but the virus has claimed more than 255,000 lives, according to data compiled by US-based Johns Hopkins University.