Global Coronavirus Infections Pass 20mn

More than 20 million coronavirus cases have now been reported worldwide, more than half in the Americas, according to an AFP official source count of 2215 GMT on Monday.

At least 20,002,577 cases and 733,842 deaths have been recorded. More than four of the 10 coronavirus cases have been registered in the United States and Brazil, the two most afflicted countries in the world.

While the US reported 5,075,678 cases and 163,282 deaths, Brazil documented 3,057,470 infections and 101,752 deaths.

The speed of the pandemic seems to be stabilizing across the planet, with an estimated one million cases identified roughly every four days after mid-July.

It took 94 days for one million infections to be reported, following the declaration of the first confirmed case in China. Eighty-six days later, on June 28, the 10 million marks was raised. Since then, the amount of reported infections has increased in a month and a half.

Latin America and the Caribbean, the hardest-hit region with 5,601,470 cases and 221,281 deaths, continues to experience rapid spread with 576,583 new infections reported in the last seven days.

It is followed by Asia (495,663), Canada and the US (379,017), Europe (153,879), Africa (89,644), Middle East (74,588) and Oceania (3,372).

Canada and the United States make up the second hardest-hit region overall, having recorded 5,195,417 cases and 172,300 deaths, ahead of Asia (3,493,026 cases, 72,486 deaths), Europe (3,374,166 cases, 213,484 deaths) and the Middle East (1,257,417 cases, 30,363 deaths).

Africa (1,057,730 infections, 23,582 deaths), which is the least-affected continent after Oceania (23,351, 346), has recorded more than half of its cases in South Africa.

India is the country with the most latest infections over the last week (402.287), ahead of the United States (376.471), which on Sunday crossed the five million level of officially registered cases. Brazil (301,745), Colombia (69,830) and Peru (49,174) are the next most impacted nations.

The amount of infections represents just a fraction of the real number of incidents since many countries use tests primarily to detect or may not have adequate capacity to carry out comprehensive research.