Some 32,548 people have died in Brazil since the start of the pandemic, and the country has recorded 1,349 new victims in 24 hours. In total, the country has 584,016 confirmed cases. 

Brazil has recorded 1,349 coronavirus deaths in 24 hours, a new record for this South American country, the new epicenter of the epidemic, the Ministry of Health announced on Wednesday. Some 32,548 people died from Covid-19 in Brazil, which now has 584,016 confirmed cases, the highest number of infections behind the United States.

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A curfew was also imposed from Wednesday in twenty locations in the state of Bahia, in northeast Brazil, to try to contain the spread of the pandemic. "If we do not act, we risk seeing an explosion in demand for intensive care beds and we will not be able to meet them," warned Bahia state governor Rui Costa.

Brazil, whose president Jair Bolsonaro regularly calls for the lifting of restrictions to preserve the economy and jobs, accounts for more than half of the cases of contamination and deaths of Covid-19 in Latin America.

In Mexico, double the number of deaths in 24 hours 

In Mexico, the number of victims in 24 hours doubled Wednesday and crossed the threshold of 1,000 for the first time, with 1,092 deaths recorded against 470 the day before, according to the official balance sheet of the government.

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The Covid-19 killed 11,729 people in Mexico, the second heaviest death toll in Latin America behind Brazil. A total of 101,238 confirmed cases of contamination have been reported there since the start of the pandemic.

The head of the strategy against the Covid-19 in Mexico, Hugo Lopez-Gatell, undersecretary for Health, told AFP last Friday that he believed the country was likely to reach the toll of 30,000 dead.