PARIS: The novel coronavirus has killed at least 5,144,573 people since the outbreak emerged in China in December 2019, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP at 1100 GMT on Sunday.
At least 256,540,190 cases of coronavirus have been registered. The vast majority have recovered, though some have continued to experience symptoms weeks or even months later.
The figures are based on daily reports provided by health authorities in each country. They exclude revisions made by other statistical organisations, which show that the number of deaths is much higher.
The World Health Organization estimates that the pandemic's overall toll could be two to three times higher than official records, due to the excess mortality that is directly and indirectly linked to Covid-19. A large number of the less severe or asymptomatic cases also remain undetected, despite intensified testing in many countries.
On Saturday, 6,246 new deaths and 478,166 new cases were recorded worldwide. Based on latest reports, the countries with the most new deaths were Russia with 1,252 new deaths, followed by Poland with 382 and Ukraine with 377.
Coronavirus toll at 1100 GMT Thursday
The United States is the worst-affected country with 771,013 deaths from 47,701,533 cases.
After the US, the hardest-hit countries are Brazil with 612,587 deaths from 22,012,150 cases, India with 465,662 deaths from 34,510,413 cases, Mexico with 292,372 deaths from 3,862,137 cases, and Russia with 264,095 deaths from 9,331,158 cases.
The country with the highest number of deaths compared to its population is Peru with 609 fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by Bulgaria with 390, Bosnia-Herzegovina with 372, Montenegro with 356, North Macedonia with 356, Hungary with 339 and the Czech Republic with 300.
Latin America and the Caribbean overall has 1,534,602 deaths from 46,446,896 cases, Europe 1,482,695 deaths from 80,774,710 infections, and Asia 889,235 deaths from 56,781,178 cases.
The United States and Canada has reported 800,494 deaths from 49,463,967 cases, Africa 221,474 deaths from 8,582,796 cases, Middle East 212,917 deaths from 14,197,694 cases, and Oceania 3,156 deaths from 292,957 cases.
As a result of corrections by national authorities or late publication of data, the figures updated over the past 24 hours may not correspond exactly to the previous day's tallies.