Global death toll hits 500, 000
PARIS - The global death toll from the coronavirus pandemic has topped half a million, AFP reports.
In another grim milestone, the number of infections recorded worldwide rose to more than 10 million, according to an AFP tally, complicating efforts to ease restrictions on debilitated economies.
The US has recorded more than 125, 000 deaths and 2.5 million cases - both around a quarter of the global totals.
The second hardest-hit country Brazil registered 259, 105 infections in the past week - the country's highest of any week during the pandemic.
The latest figures came as protesters in cities across Brazil - and as far away as Stockholm, London and Barcelona - held demonstrations against President Jair Bolsonaro, who has said the virus is akin to a "little flu" and railed against stay- at-home measures.
In the UK, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said his country had gone through a "profound shock" as he prepared to unveil a large stimulus programme.
"I think this is the moment for a Rooseveltian approach to the UK," Johnson said, referring to former US president Franklin
D. Roosevelt's New Deal economic response to the Great Depression.
The Middle East's most affected country Iran reported 162 more deaths on Monday, its highest single-day toll yet, a day after the country made mask-wearing mandatory for inside gatherings.
Reuters reports that a spike
in US coronavirus infections is fuelled in large part by people ignoring public health guidelines to keep their distance and wear masks, the government's top infectious disease official said.
A daily surge in confirmed cases has been most pronounced in southern and western states that did not follow health officials' recommendations to wait for a steady decline in infections for two weeks before reopening their economies.
"That's a recipe for disaster," Anthony Fauci, who directs the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN in an interview broadcast on Monday.