More than 25 million people have been diagnosed with the novel coronavirus.
As of Sunday afternoon, the latest data from Johns Hopkins University counted 25,079,330 known infections and 843,842 confirmed deaths. More than 16.4 million people have recovered after falling ill.
The epicentre of the virus, the United States, accounts for roughly 23.8 per cent of the world’s confirmed cases at 5,982,692.
So far, 182,789 people in the United States have died from the virus. In comparison, Brazil and India, the next two countries with the highest number of known cases, are tallied at 183,960 confirmed deaths between the two of them.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said last month they believe the true number of people who have contracted COVID-19 to be between two and 10 times higher in the U.S., due to cases that were either undiagnosed or unreported by people who avoided seeking medical attention.
In Canada, known case numbers are on the rise, although they are significantly down from its peak in the spring.
Canada’s top public health official, Dr. Theresa Tam, said in a statement Sunday the country had seen an almost a 13 per cent increase in the average daily case count, resulting in around 425 reported cases across Canada per day over the past week.
However, she said all known hospitalizations, critical care admissions and the number of people who die are considered “late indicators” of COVID-19 severity.
“This is because increases in hospitalizations, critical care admissions and deaths are known to lag behind real-time increases in COVID-19 illness by a few to many weeks, respectively,” she said.
As of Sunday afternoon, 127,870 people had been diagnosed with COVID-19 in Canada, while 9,117 people had died. There were 113,663 recoveries across the country and more than 6.3 million tests for the virus had been administered.
Tam said health officials detected the virus in 0.7 per cent of the country’s population, adding almost 50 per cent of recent cases in Canada were reported in young people aged between 20 and 39 years old.
“With mild and asymptomatic infection occurring more often in younger individuals, it is possible to spread the virus without realizing,” she said.
This is true for South Korea, where officials said the country’s second wave stemmed from multiple nightclub visits during a holiday weekend in May, including a spike of 34 new cases — many of which South Korea’s CDC traced to a man in his 20s who attended several clubs in Seoul.
On Sunday, the Associated Press said the country recorded its 17th consecutive day of case surges in the triple digits for a total of 19,699 confirmed infections and 323 known deaths.
India now has the fastest-growing daily coronavirus case count of any other country in the world, recording more than 75,000 infections for the fourth consecutive day, according to the Associated Press.
As of Sunday, Johns Hopkins reported the country had diagnosed 3,542,733 cases of the virus and confirmed 63,498 deaths.
The surge in numbers comes as the country reopened its subway networks, allowing restricted access to sporting and religious events.
— With files from The Canadian Press.