March 20, 2020 - 20:02 AMT
Coronavirus in the world: Italy now has highest death toll globally

The novel coronavirus pandemic has claimed the lives of more than 10,000 people worldwide, as Italy’s death toll overtook that of China.

Global cases have passed 245,000, Reuters says.

At least 1,000 people have died in Spain so far from the new coronavirus, while the total number of infections in the country has reached almost 20,000, Al Jazeera says.

The death toll from the coronavirus outbreak in Italy has also risen in the last 24 hours to more than 3,400, overtaking the total number of deaths so far registered in China, officials said.

French health authorities revealed 108 new deaths from coronavirus on Thursday, taking the total to 372 or an increase of almost 41%, the toll rising sharply yet again as the country was in its third day of a lockdown aimed at containing the outbreak, Reuters says.

Other nations with high COVID-19 rates are: South Korea, which now has 8,652 cases and 84 deaths, and Iran, which has 18,407 cases and 1,284 deaths.

Mainland China had 39 new confirmed cases on Thursday, the country's National Health Commission said on Friday, all of which were imported cases. There were no locally transmitted cases for a second day.

In the United States, at least 205 deaths have been registered, according to the CDC and state health officials, and at least 14,250 cases have been reported across 50 states, CNBC reports.