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Gravediggers bury the body of a person who died from the coronavirus disease in Sao Francisco Xavier cemetery, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, May 29, 2020. /Reuters
More than 100,000 cases of COVID-19 have been reported to World Health Organization (WHO) for each of the past five days, and the Americas continues to account for the most cases, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday, adding his organization is especially worried about Central and South America, where many countries are witnessing accelerating epidemics.
"For several weeks, the number of cases reported each day in the Americas has been more than the rest of the world put together," he said.
Earlier, the organization declared Latin America the new epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic as the region's daily death rate exceededthat in either the U.S.or Europe.
According to the latest figurefrom the Coronavirus Resource Center of Johns Hopkins University, there have been 6,511,696confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 386,073 deaths. The U.S.remains the hardest-hit country by the virus, with a total of 1,851,520confirmed cases and 107,175deaths.
Brazil, the second on the coronavirus mapin terms of the confirmed cases, has so far registered 32,548 deaths and 584,016 total confirmed cases. Thebiggest economy in Latin America recorded 1,349 new coronavirus deaths on Wednesday, a record number of daily deaths.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro who has dismissed the virus as the "little flu," keeps dismissing social distancing by riding a police horse through a crowd in Brasilia this weekend, shaking hands with supporters.
So far, he has continued to maintain that protecting Brazil's economy is the most important consideration, despite widespread domestic and international criticism of his handling of the outbreak and a rapidly rising death toll.
Earlier, the president called for the wider use of antimalarial drugs to treat COVID-19, in defiance of public health experts warning of their possible health risks, and he received two million doses of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) form the U.S. last Sunday.
Peru, Chile and Mexico followed Brazil's footsteps closely, with 178, 914, 113,628 and 101,238 confirmed cases respectively, are among the top 15 countries in terms of the number of confirmed cases.
In Mexico, the Mexican government had previously predicted the pandemic would peak in early May and under U.S. pressure has begun reopening its vast auto industry, which underpins billions of dollars of business through cross-border supply chains.
However, plans to further relax social distancing measures this week were put on hold in recognition of the fact that infections had not yet begun coming down.
