BERLIN

Germany set a new daily record for COVID-19 cases for the second day in a row on Friday.

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) confirmed 29,875 more coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, up from 23,679 on Thursday.

The institute also reported a record high 598 deaths, pushing the official tally to 20,970.

Despite a partial lockdown which began on Nov. 2, the seven-day average of new infections in Germany has remained above 20,000.

“The high nationwide number of cases is caused by increasingly diffuse transmission, with numerous clusters especially in households and nursing and long-term care homes, but also in occupational settings, community facilities and related to religious events,” RKI said in its latest report.

As of Thursday, 4,339 coronavirus patients were receiving treatment in intensive care units, with 2,505 of them on ventilators.

Germany’s current tally of over 1.27 million coronavirus infections is the fifth-highest in Europe, behind France, Spain, the UK, and Italy.