Turkey has been ranked at 97th position out of 100 countries in a coronavirus data transparency index published by an independent research group.

Scoring just 18.7 per cent overall in the COVID Data Transparency Index (CDTI) – an effective zero-star rating – Turkey falls significantly below the 70 per cent level that London-based research group TotalAnalysis argues all countries should attain 10 months into the pandemic.

The US ranks in third place while the UK appears in 27th place.

The index ranks countries on a variety of coronavirus indicators, grouped into four pillars – data transparency, coverage, usage and management.

The research team at TotalAnalysis say they have been monitoring and extracting official Covid data from more than 200 countries and their local regions on a daily basis since the outbreak of the pandemic.

Director of Research Mike Laflin said: “For a country with a population of 85 million, Turkey has major issues in the areas of data transparency, especially in its haphazard recording of infections, actives and recoveries, which have seen some huge and abrupt revisions.”

Turkey has signed an agreement with China’s Sinovac for a total of 50 million vaccines, of which the first 3 million were delivered on December 30. Ankara has also signed a deal with BioNTech-Pfizer to procure 30 million doses.

Only four countries (Belgium, Norway, the US and Chile) have scored above 70 per cent on the firm's data transparency index, according to the group's research. At the other end of the scale sit North Korea and Turkmenistan, in joint 99th position with a zero score, both countries being in "total COVID-denial" with not a single infection reported.

Notable countries scoring less than 50 per cent and judged to be delivering unreliable coronavirus data include Brazil in 48th place, Russia in 57th and India in 73rd, while China sits just four off the bottom in 96th place – one spot above Turkey.

Turkey's Daily Sabah website reported on Tuesday that Turkey recorded 14,494 new coronavirus cases and 194 deaths over the previous 24 hours, citing Health Ministry figures. According to ministry data, the total number of COVID-19 cases in Turkey since the outbreak increased to 2,270,101 including Tuesday's figures, with the total death toll rising to 21,879.

File footage filmed by Jenna Pope from April 2020 shows Istanbul's streets and squares empty during the first wave of the pandemic.

Istanbul's streets and squares empty out during the Coronavirus pandemic. Filmed by Jenna Pope