Ankara, Aug 16 : Turkey has recorded the highest number of daily coronavirus cases for the past 45 days, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said. The country reported 1,256 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, raising the total caseload to 248,117, Xinhua news agency quoted the Minister as saying in a tweet. Meanwhile, 21 people died in the past 24 hours, taking the death toll to 5,955, Koca said. Turkish health professionals conducted 67,214 tests in the past 24 hours, bringing the overall number of tests to 5,659,286, he said. A total of 992 patients recovered in the last 24 hours, raising the total recoveries to 229,972 in Turkey since the outbreak, Koca added. The rate of pneumonia in the infected patients is 7.6 per cent and the number of seriously ill patients is 668, he stated. Turkey reported the first Covid-19 case on March 11. /IANS