Austria reports record daily new COVID-19 cases

2020-10-24 14:05:49 GMT2020-10-24 22:05:49(Beijing Time) Xinhua English

VIENNA, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- Austria reported on Saturday 3,614 new COVID-19 infections within the past 24 hours, a record high and the first time beyond 3,000-mark since the outbreak of the pandemic in the Alpine country, according to data published by its Interior Ministry.

Compared with Friday's 2,571, the daily caseload jumped by over 1,000.

So far, there have been 78,029 positive test results. As of Saturday morning, 965 people had died and 56,791 had recovered from COVID-19.

There are currently 1,177 people in hospital for coronavirus treatment, 175 of them in intensive care units, data showed.

About 60 percent of the coronavirus clusters were associated with private households in the past week, reported local media, quoting the weekly analysis released by the Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES) on Friday.

"We don't know how the virus gets into households. Every household cluster has a source case, the source of which is still unclear," said AGES chief epidemiologist Daniela Schmid to Austrian broadcaster ORF.

In order to curb the spread of the coronavirus and prevent a second lockdown, the government introduced tightened measures including a limit of indoor gatherings to six people and allowing states to impose regional restrictions such as curfews. These measures will come into effect from Sunday and apply for at least four weeks.

As the world is struggling to contain the pandemic, countries including France, China, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States are racing to find a vaccine.

According to the website of the World Health Organization, as of Oct. 19, there were 198 COVID-19 candidate vaccines being developed worldwide, and 44 of them were in clinical trials. Enditem

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