More COVID-19 cases, deaths reported in rest of world than in China — WHO

GENEVA — There have now been more COVID-19 cases and deaths in the rest of the world than in China, the World Health Organisation said Monday.

"More cases and deaths have now been reported in the rest of the world than in China," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters in Geneva, without providing the latest numbers.

According to an AFP tally based on official sources, more than 169,710 cases have been recorded in 142 countries and territories. The death toll stood at 6,640.

Italy on Monday reported 349 new deaths from the novel coronavirus, taking its total since last month to 2,158, the most after China.

The number of official COVID-19 fatalities has more than doubled since Thursday, when Italy's toll topped 1,000 for the first time. Italy now has 27,980 infections, compared to 15,113 four days ago.

It has reported more than 700 deaths in two days.

Among specific regions, the overwhelming majority of the fatalities remained largely confined to northern regions, where the virus first started spreading around cities such as Milan.

Meanwhile, Spain has registered nearly 1,000 new COVID-19 infections over the past 24 hours, raising the total number of cases to 8,744, the health ministry said on Monday.

Over the same period, the number of deaths rose by nine to 297, the ministry's emergencies coordinator Fernando Simon said.

The figure for new cases was lower than weekend numbers, when 2,000 infections were detected between Saturday and Sunday and the number of deaths rose by around 100.

Of the total number, Madrid remains the worst-affected region, with 4,665 cases.

In order to rein in the virus, Spain has declared a state of alert, shutting all but essential services and ordering its population of 46 million people to stay at home. People are only authorised to go out to buy food or medicine, to go to work or to get medical treatment.