Madrid, May 23 (IANS): The Spanish Ministry of Health, Consumer Affairs and Social Services has confirmed slight increases in the number of new deaths and cases of COVID-19.
Within the 24-hour period from midnight Wednesday to midnight Thursday, 56 people lost their lives to COVID-19, more than the 48 confirmed in the previous 24-hour period, taking the country's death toll from the disease to 28,628, Xinhua reported.
The total number of deaths is considerably higher than Thursday's total of 27,940, due to the inclusion of over 630 prior deaths in Catalonia which had not previously been included, the Ministry said on Friday.
There was also an increase in the number of new cases of COVID-19 detected by PCR tests (which discovers if the coronavirus is active in the body). The Health Ministry reported 446 new infections, compared with 344 new cases 24 hours earlier, taking the total number of confirmed cases to 234,824.