Germany and Russia reported their highest ever daily COVID-19 death tolls on Wednesday.
German authorities announced on Wednesday morning that 410 people had passed away due to COVID-19 over the previous 24 hours. This is the highest one-day death toll the country has recorded since the beginning of the pandemic, according to worldometer.
The number of fatalities linked to the pandemic in Germany now stands at 14,771.
Chancellor Angela Merkel announced on Wednesday that and the country’s 16 state governors had agreed to extend a partial shutdown well into December in an effort to further reduce the rate of COVID-19 infections ahead of the Christmas period. The so-called “wave breaker” came into force November 2.
Authorities in Moscow also registered a record number of deaths on Wednesday. The daily increase of 507 — which narrowly beat the previous record of 491 set just the day before — has brought the total death toll to 37,538.
More than 23,700 new infections were also confirmed, bringing the country’s caseload to over 2.1 million — the fifth highest in the world.
Croatia, meanwhile, registered a record number of new infections with more than 3,600 cases confirmed over the previous day. Just over 11,600 of the country’s four million inhabitants have so far tested positive with the death toll currently at 1,501 following the passing of 56 people over the previous 24 hours.
In neighbouring Hungary, the number of hospitalizations and patients being treated on ventilators have also reached record levels.
According to the figures from the government, 7,718 patients were being treated in hospitals, of which 656 were on ventilators, both record highs. The total number of coronavirus-related deaths rose by 106 to 4,114 in the country of nearly 10 million inhabitants.
In the past week, the 51 countries making up the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) European region accounted for 44 per cent of the world’s 4 million new infections, a decrease of 6 per cent from the week prior, according to figures released Wednesday.
But the number of deaths increased by 10 per cent week-on-week with 32,684 fatalities recorded — 49 per cent of the 67,221 deaths registered worldwide.
The figures appear to indicate that new measures, including national lockdowns, imposed across the continent are starting to take effect with the virus slowing down.
Three European countries have passed the grim milestone of 50,000 deaths: France, Italy, and the UK.
euronews.com
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