Coronavirus Death Toll Soars To 811 In China, Surpasses SARS Fatalities Worldwide

The death toll in China due to novel coronavirus epidemic rose to 811, while the confirmed cases jumped to over 37,000, the National Health Commission announced on Sunday.

The toll is now higher than the global number of deaths caused by the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) virus, which killed 774 people in 2002-2003.

Eighty-nine deaths were reported on Saturday and there were 2,656 new confirmed cases of the deadly infection, it said in its daily report.

A total of 811 people have died of the disease so far and 37,198 confirmed cases have been reported in 31 provincial-level regions, according to the commission.

Among the 89 deaths, 81 were from Hubei province, the epicentre of the outbreak, two in Henan, and one each in Hebei, Heilongjiang, Anhui, Shandong, Hunan and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, it said.

On Saturday, 600 people recovered and walked out of the hospitals. This included 324 in Hubei province, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

The new virus is believed to have emerged last year in a market that sells wild animals in Hubei's capital Wuhan, the city at the centre of the outbreak, before spreading across the country.

The World Health Organization said on Saturday that the number of cases being reported daily in China is "stabilising" -- but cautioned that it was too early to say if the virus has peaked.

(With PTI inputs)