Global COVID-19 cases have hit record highs with several hotspots across the world
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- Several countries across the globe have emerged as COVID-19 hotspots.
- India has accounted for more than 40% of the world's daily new cases.
- South American and Eastern European countries are also recording record cases and deaths.
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For more than a week, global COVID-19 cases have averaged a daily rate of more than 800,000, The New York Times reported.
While India has recorded record rates, surpassing 400,000 daily cases on Saturday, multiple countries across the world are hotspots experiencing surges.
The World Health Organization said last week that global cases have been on the rise for nine consecutive weeks and deaths have been up for six weeks.
"To put it in perspective, there were almost as many cases globally last week as in the first five months of the pandemic," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
CNN reported Iran went into a partial lockdown and has reported its highest daily COVID-19 death toll since the pandemic started.
Countries in South America are also facing a very grim reality. Brazil, which has reported over 14.5 million cases with close to 400,000 deaths, has the highest daily rate of deaths in the world. Several other Latin American countries including Peru, Argentina, and Colombia are ranked in the top 20 for the highest daily death rate.
Uruguay, which has a population of only 3.5 million people, has reported almost 3,000 new cases per day and now has the world's highest cases per capita, the Times reported.
Central and Eastern European countries account for half of the top 20 countries with the highest daily death tolls.
On Thursday, Turkey went into a lockdown after infection rates soared, the BBC reported. While cases were down in February, they quickly rose to more than 60,000 new cases a day in mid-April after the government eased restrictions the month prior.
Variants like the B.1.1.7 strain have also contributed to keeping infection numbers high in countries like France, the Netherlands, and Sweden, the Times reported.
In a recent WHO briefing, Ghebreyesus said he appreciated how many countries have pledged to send or have sent aid to help India, which now accounts for around 40% of the world's overall cases, but added: "At the same time, we must remember that many other countries all over the world are still experiencing intense transmission," and also need help.
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