IANS
Berlin
The number of deaths related to Covid-19 in Germany since the outbreak of the pandemic has passed the 50,000 mark, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announced
on Friday.
“That is a depressing, for me, almost inconceivable number,” said RKI President Lothar Wieler during a press conference on Friday, adding that it remained ‘really essential’ to follow Covid-19
measures consistently.
Covid-19 deaths in Germany increased by 859 in one day, bringing the official death toll to 50,642, according to the federal government agency for disease control and prevention, the Xinhua news
agency reported.
It was ‘unfortunate’ that the number of Covid-19 outbreaks in nursing homes and older people’s homes in Germany was so high, said Wieler. Currently, around 900 outbreaks in such facilities were registered throughout
the country.
New infections within one day stood at 17,862, below the previous week’s level, RKI noted. So far, more than 2.1 million Covid-19 cases have officially been registered in Germany.
During the press conference, Minister of Health Jens Spahn said Covid-19 case numbers were “encouraging in recent days and are heading in the right direction.”
He added that despite the positive development, infection numbers were still ‘too high’.