Coronavirus Death Toll Soars To 1,500

BEIJING: The death toll in China's novel coronavirus outbreak has spiked to nearly 1,500. In China's most affected Hubei province recorded 121 new fatalities. The number of infected cases jumped to nearly 65,000, according to health officials on Friday.

The National Health Commission said, with 5,090 new cases the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases soared up to 64,894 as of Thursday.

The World Health Organisation on Thursday said a sharp rise of 254 cases of COVID-19 (official name for coronavirus) cases in China, due to a change in counting methods, did not represent a big shift in the epidemic.

Of the 254, Hubei and its provincial capital Wuhan reported 242 deaths, the single highest in a day so far. "This does not represent a significant change in the trajectory of the outbreak," Michael Ryan, head of WHO's health emergencies programme, told a press conference in Geneva.

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