Mexico City (AFP) - Mexico's coronavirus death toll surged past 50,000 on Thursday, the government said, just days after becoming the third-highest in the world.
The health ministry announced 819 more deaths in its daily update, taking the total to 50,517 since the Latin American country's first case was detected in February.
The overall number of infections registered now stands at 462,690 in the nation of more than 128 million.
"Unfortunately, because it is always unfortunate even if it was only one, we have 50,517 deaths from COVID-19 in Mexico," deputy health minister Hugo Lopez Gatell told a news conference.
Mexico recently overtook Britain to become the third hardest-hit country in terms of virus deaths, after Brazil and the United States.
Its fatality toll far exceeds the range of between 6,000 and 30,000 that the government of leftist President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador projected at the end of February.
His government, which began easing lockdown measures at the start of June, has faced scrutiny over its handling of the crisis.
The pandemic has dealt a heavy blow to Mexico's economy, the second biggest in Latin America.
Gross domestic product (GDP) plunged 17.3 percent in the second quarter of the year from the previous quarter.
