Thailand registers record number of daily COVID deaths

JAKARTA, Indonesia

Thailand registered a record number of daily coronavirus fatalities Thursday as 165 people died over the past day, taking the country’s death toll to 4,562.

Cases also jumped to a new single-day high of 17,669 in the last 24 hours as the more infectious Delta variant drives a surge in the country, pushing the nationwide count to 561,030.

The number of coronavirus cases in Southeast Asian countries continued to rise Wednesday as total infections surpassed 7 million, including 136,225 fatalities and more than 5.6 million recoveries, according to official figures.

Meanwhile, the number of active cases among Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states stands at 1,147,747.

Indonesia recorded the highest number of infections with 3,287,727, including 88,659 deaths, followed by the Philippines with 1,566,667 cases and 27,401 fatalities.

Malaysia came in third with a total of 1,061,476 cases, including 8,551 deaths.

Laos also recorded a single-day spike Wednesday with 280 cases, raising the toll to 5,434, while Brunei Darussalam remains the country with the lowest number of infections with 333 cases registered so far.

Countries in the region have administered more than 146 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines, according to figures released Wednesday.

*Writing by Rhany Chairunissa Rufinaldo with Anadolu Agency’s Indonesian language services in Jakarta