Global COVID deaths cross 2.7 m mark; cases near 123 m

Monday, 22 March 2021 03:36 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Asia has reported 265,857 deaths from 16.9 m cases

PARIS, AFP: The novel coronavirus has killed at least 2,710,382 people since the outbreak emerged in China in December 2019, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP at 1100 GMT on Sunday.

At least 122,737,460 cases of coronavirus have been registered. The vast majority have recovered, though some have continued to experience symptoms weeks or even months later.

These figures are based on daily tolls provided by health authorities in each country and exclude later re-evaluations by statistical organisations, as has happened in Russia, Spain and Britain.

On Saturday, 8,635 new deaths and 509,629 new cases were recorded worldwide. Based on latest reports, the countries with the most new deaths were Brazil with 2,438 new deaths, followed by United States with 937 and Mexico with 608.

The United States is the worst-affected country with 541,918 deaths from 29,784,001 cases. After the US, the hardest-hit countries are Brazil with 292,752 deaths from 11,950,459 cases, Mexico with 197,827 deaths from 2,193,639 cases, India with 159,755 deaths from 11,559,130 cases, and the United Kingdom with 126,122 deaths from 4,291,271 cases.

The country with the highest number of deaths compared to its population is the Czech Republic with 230 fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by Belgium with 195, Slovenia 191, Montenegro 190 and Hungary 187.

Europe overall has 917,542 deaths from 41,252,892 cases, Latin America and the Caribbean 741,483 deaths from 23,521,822 infections, and the United States and Canada 564,554 deaths from 30,713,762 cases.

Asia has reported 265,857 deaths from 16,961,887 cases, the Middle East 110,273 deaths from 6,151,094 cases, Africa 109,700 deaths from 4,101,259 cases, and Oceania 973 deaths from 34,746 cases.

Since the start of the pandemic, the number of tests conducted has greatly increased while testing and reporting techniques have improved, leading to a rise in reported cases.

However, the number of diagnosed cases is only a part of the real total number of infections as a significant number of less serious or asymptomatic cases always remain undetected.

As a result of corrections by national authorities or late publication of data, the figures updated over the past 24 hours may not correspond exactly to the previous day’s tallies.