LONDON — Coronavirus is continuing its spread across the world with more than 56 million (56,849,219) confirmed cases in 190 countries and 1,360.181 million deaths. The virus is surging in many regions and countries that had apparent success in suppressing initial outbreaks are also seeing infections rise again.

North America is currently seeing the steepest rise in new cases. The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that health workers and health systems "are being pushed to the breaking point".

"This is a dangerous virus, which can attack every system in the body," said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. "Those countries that are letting the virus run unchecked are playing with fire."

Coronavirus cases have surged over the past few months in several regions of the world and the rate of infection is still increasing. The most recent figures show more than 650,000 new cases reported in 24 hours.

In Moscow, Russia on Friday recorded 461 new deaths with the novel coronavirus and 24,318 new infections during the past 24 hours. The Russian coronavirus crisis center said in a statement the death toll climbed to 35,311 and the caseload to 2,039,926 since the outbreak of the pandemic. Number of recoveries in the last 24 hours reached 24,758 with the overall number of the recuperated hitting 1,551, 414.

Germany recorded 23,648 new coronavirus and 260 deaths on Friday. According to Robert Koch Institute, the new figures raised the total number of cases to 879,564 and the deaths to 13,630.

The number of new COVID-19 infections in Germany is still much too high and is causing a serious pandemic situation, the head of the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases (RKI), Lothar Wieler, said on Thursday, according to Reuters.

The head of RKI's surveillance unit, Ute Rexroth, added there are indications that Germany's new distancing measures are working after the number of new infections has stabilized.

In Brussels, total infections in Belgium Friday increased to 550,264 with 4,477 new infections reported by Belgian health authorities. Up to 171 more deaths from COVID-19 were reported in the last 24 hours, raising the total death toll to 15,196

In Vienna, Austria declared Friday that it had recorded 6708 new infection cases with the coronavirus caseload rising to 234,778. The Health Ministry said total recoveries reached 149,000, adding that the number of swab test hit one million nationwide and total deaths 1,116.

In New Delhi, Indian health authorities said on Friday that 584 people died of coronavirus while 45,882 tested positive across the country in the past 24 hours. According to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, the death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 132,162 while the tally of positive cases reached 9,004,365. The ministry said 8,428,409 people have recovered from the pandemic.

In Tunis, Tunisia recorded 1,223 new coronavirus cases and 70 deaths on Friday. The new figures raised the total number of cases to 84,995 and the deaths 2,611 while recoveries reached 59,334, according to health authorities.

In Tokyo. Japan reported 1,7745 new coronavirus cases and 21 deaths on Friday, Health Ministry said. The new figures raised the total cases to 126,746 and the death toll to 15,196.

“We must take maximum caution, as a record number of new coronavirus cases nationwide was confirmed on Thursday, and the seven-day moving average of daily cases doubled in the last two weeks,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said. — Agencies