Bangladesh's virus caseload surpasses 500,000

Bangladesh's coronavirus tally has crossed 500,000, hitting another grim milestone in the pandemic.

The tally of infections climbed to 500,713 on the back of 1,153 new cases recorded in the 24 hours to 8 am Sunday, according to data released by the government.

Another 38 new fatalities were registered in the same period, taking the death toll to 7,280.

The number of fresh recoveries outpaced active cases in the last 24 hours as 1,926 patients recovered from the illness through treatment at home and in hospital care, bringing the total to 437,527.

As many as 13,316 samples were tested at 160 authorised labs across the country in the last 24 hours, yielding a positivity rate of 8.66 percent.

The latest official figures put the recovery rate at 87.37 percent while the mortality rate stands at 1.45 percent.

Globally, over 76.3 million people have been infected by the novel coronavirus and 1.68 million have died, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Infections have been reported in more than 210 countries and territories since the first cases were identified in China in December 2019.