Rio de Janerio, Jan 20 (IANS): Brazil registered 1,192 deaths from Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, raising the nationwide tally to 211,491, the Ministry of Health said.

Tests detected 62,094 new cases, bringing the national caseload to 8,573,864, it said on Tuesday.

The state of Sao Paulo, the most populated in the country, is the hardest hit, with 50,318 deaths and 1,644,225 cases, followed by Rio de Janeiro, with 28,026 deaths and 486,806 cases, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Brazil has the world's second-highest Covid-19 death toll, second only to the US, and the third-largest outbreak, after the US and India. The country is experiencing a second wave of Covid-19, with cases and deaths on the rise since December.

Vaccination against Covid-19 began on Sunday after Brazil's Health Regulatory Agency authorized the emergency use of CoronaVac, a vaccine manufactured by Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac in collaboration with the Butantan Institute of Sao Paulo.