Coronavirus deaths hit new daily record in Russia

Daily coronavirus deaths in Russia hit another record at 852 on Tuesday, as infections continued to creep up in the country.

Tuesday's record marked an increase on the previous record of 828, registered last Friday.

A senior doctor at a hospital in Nizhny Novgorod said while the course of COVID-19 hadn't changed much, the time between the onset of the disease and the patient entering a critical state had shortened.

Daily coronavirus infections in Russia have fallen from more than 20,000 in late August to about 18,000 in mid-September.

However, the numbers have started rising again.

Since last Thursday, the state coronavirus task force has been reporting more than 21,000 new cases a day.

On Tuesday, 21,559 new infections were registered.

Despite the increase, there are few restrictions in place in Russia, which had one six-week lockdown last spring.

Vaccination rates have remained low, too, with only 32% of the country’s 146 million population having received at least one shot of a vaccine and only 28% fully vaccinated.

Russian authorities have reported a total of about 7.4 million confirmed infections and more than 205,000 confirmed deaths.

However, reports by the government’s statistical service Rosstat indicates the tally of coronavirus-linked deaths retroactively reveal much higher mortality numbers.