MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 25th May, 2020) The global coronavirus caseload has topped 5.3 million, with more than 342,000 people dying, the US-based Johns Hopkins University has estimated. The death toll in the United States has neared 100,000 as the country eases limits on public life ahead of the Memorial Day.
The World Health Organization has put the overall tally at more than 5.2 million. The UN agency recorded 101,502 new coronavirus cases and 4,286 deaths worldwide. Overall, Americas account for 2.3 million cases.
Brazil, which is emerging as the world's next coronavirus hotspot, has recorded more than 22,000 deaths, up from 15,000 a week ago. With 347,398 confirmed cases, it has surpassed Russia and is second only to the US with some 1.6 million cases.
Russia recorded 8,599 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 344,481, the national coronavirus response center said. The death toll has increased by 153 to 3,541.
China, where the virus emerged in December, has continued the no-death streak it has had for over a month. Three new confirmed cases were reported on Sunday, two of them imported. A total of 4,634 have died in China since the start of the outbreak.
The number of confirmed cases in India has risen by another record 6,767 over the past day to 131,868 as the upward trend continues, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has said.
Iran's cases have continued to rise after the country eased restrictions in mid-April and allowed religious services to resume earlier this month. The country saw another 2,180 cases on Sunday, up from the daily low of 802 reported on May 2. The total is now 135,701.
The daily death toll in the US state of New York again topped 100 on Saturday after dropping to a record low of 84 on Friday. The state has registered 109 new deaths, Governor Andrew Cuomo said Sunday, bringing the total to 23,282.
Germany's new cluster has been linked to a Baptist church in the central city of Frankfurt, the health minister of Hesse state has said. At least 107 people are believed to have caught the virus during a service there two weeks ago.
Japan's advisory panel on the health crisis will meet on Monday to discuss lifting the state of emergency in the capital of Tokyo and four remaining prefectures as the number of new cases continues to decline.
The Iranian and Turkish presidents have discussed reopening land and air borders in an effort to revive bilateral trade and goods traffic after they ground to a halt due to the pandemic.
Tunisia, which depends heavily on tourism for income, plans to reopen its economy by mid-June and kick-start the summer holiday season by early July, Prime Minister Elyes Fakhfakh has reportedly said.
Half of the Russian regions meet the criteria for easing coronavirus restrictions and could be cleared to move into the first phase of the lockdown exit strategy in two weeks' time, Anna Popova, the head of the consumer safety watchdog Rospotrebnadzor said.
Pope Francis blessed worshippers from his window after the Sunday prayer for the first time in almost three months. St. Peter's Square in Vatican City reopened to the public on Monday.
Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre did not reopen on Sunday, a Sputnik correspondent in the holy city said, despite a promise made by the Greek Orthodox Church. The shrine closed on March 25 to limit the spread of the virus.
The United States will delay the G7 Summit in Washington until late June, National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien has announced. The meeting will be held in-person "if the situation permits," he said.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Beijing was ready to join the international search for the source of the pandemic but warned against politicizing the effort. The United States has sued China for virus-related damages, in a move that the diplomat said was "vexatious" and baseless.
South Korea will downsize its presence at the US-led Rim of the Pacific drills in August to two warships. It sent two destroyers, a submarine, a patrol plane and some 700 troops to the biennial exercise in 2018.
Gold-mining company AngloGold Ashanti closed the world's deepest Mponeng mine in South Africa after 164 workers tested positive for the coronavirus. The mine, which has already been running at 50 percent capacity, will be sanitized.
The much-touted vaccine candidate created by Oxford University now has only a 50 percent chance of working, according to Adrian Hill, the institute's director, who said the virus is disappearing so fast that UK researchers may not have enough volunteers to test it in by September.
The head of Thailand's National Vaccines Institute said a potential vaccine against the virus would be made widely available in late 2021. The drug has already cleared animal trials.
Russian scientists hope to complete clinical trials of an anti-coronavirus drug Favipiravir within eight weeks, Dmitry Pushkar, a doctor from the Russian Health Ministry who is in charge of the research, has told Sputnik.
