Russia passes 10,000-coronavirus-infection benchmark 10 weeks after virus set in
MOSCOW. KAZINFORM - The number of coronavirus cases across Russia has amounted to 10,131 ten weeks after the initial infections were reported in the country on January 31, TASS reports.
On that same day, the number of COVID-19 patients exceeded 10,000 in China, the epicenter of the disease. In late December 2019, Chinese officials notified the World Health Organization (WHO) about the outbreak of a previously unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, in central China. It took a month for the number to climb to 10,000 infections in the country.
On January 31, Italy’s first COVID-19 cases were reported, becoming the second hardest hit country by the virus. The benchmark of 10,000 infections was cleared in 5.5 weeks, on March 10. On the next day, the World Health Organization officially declared the outbreak a pandemic.
Week when COVID-19 surge slowed down
Over the past 24 hours, coronavirus has been confirmed in 1,459 individuals, which is 284 people or 24.2% more than the day earlier. The overall number of infections has risen by about 16.8% (against 15.7% the day before). This figure has been hovering at lower than 20% for the past seven days, with the number of coronavirus cases climbing 2.85 times in the past week. On Wednesday, the weekly increase more than tripled.
More than one million tests have been conducted across the country. In about one percent of the cases, people test positive. About 900,000 tests were reported on Wednesday.
Medical personnel’s success
For the first time since the virus hit Russia, as many as 118 coronavirus patients have been discharged from hospitals just in one day. This is one-third more than the previous record set on Tuesday.
To date, 698 patients have recovered, or almost 6.9% of the total amount. The death rate as of Thursday stood at 0.75%, which is far lower than the average figure across the globe. Early in April, mortality rate was 0.8-0.9%. The coronavirus anti-crisis center confirmed 13 deaths on Thursday, bringing the overall number of fatalities to 76.