Beijing/Washington/Paris: China on Tuesday reported no new coronavirus deaths for the first time since it started publishing figures in January, the National Health Commission said.
Cases in mainland China have been dwindling since March, but the country faces a second wave of infections brought in from overseas, with health officials reporting nearly 1,000 imported cases in total.
More than 10,000 people have died of coronavirus complications in the United States since the outbreak began in late January, Johns Hopkins University said Monday.
The Baltimore-based school, which has been keeping a running tally of global coronavirus numbers, said there are at least 3,47,003 confirmed infections in the US with 10,335 deaths.
The world's leading economy is one of the worst-hit countries, trailing only Italy (15,877) and Spain (13,055) in numbers killed by the deadly pandemic. The number of daily deaths is falling in some of the worst-affected European countries, but the US has yet to reach its peak of the crisis.
Since the middle of last week, the US has recorded more than 1,000 new deaths every day, with containment measures of varying degrees being enforced on a state-by-state basis.
Authorities have warned that between 1,00,000 and 2,40,000 people could die from COVID-19 in the US, even in a best-case scenario with social distancing guidelines being observed.
The pandemic has killed more than 70,000 worldwide since the emergence of the new coronavirus in December in China, according to an AFP tally compiled from official sources.
France on Monday reported that 833 more people had died of COVID-19 in hospitals and nursing homes over the previous 24 hours, its highest daily toll since the epidemic began.
Italy's coronavirus death toll shot up on Monday from its lowest level in more than two weeks and officials sounded a more cautious note than earlier about a possibly easing of restrictions.
The daily rise in new infections dropped to a record low of just 2.8 percent. The number of people receiving intensive care treatment for COVID-19 fell for a third successive day.
But the number of non-critical patients in hospital rose back up after its first decline since the crisis began.
The epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in Latin America, Brazil's Sao Paulo state, has said it expects 1,11,000 deaths in the next six months, and extended its stay-at-home measures another two weeks.
The forecast - an official projection, the state government said - would appear to put Brazil on track to become one of the worst-hit countries in the world.
