In Japan, the government said all but five of its 1540 new cases were transmitted domestically. The daily total was close to Friday’s record of 1579.

The spike in Japanese cases, most of them aged in their 20s and 30s, prompted warnings that young people were letting their guard down. Governor Yuriko Koike, of Tokyo, which has about one-third of the new infections, says she might declare an emergency to contain the outbreak.

In Florida, authorities were trying to prepare storm shelters while enforcing social distancing as Hurricane Isaias churned towards the heavily populated state. It was due to be near the coast early Sunday.

Florida reported 179 deaths on Saturday, raising its total to more than 7000.

The governor warned residents to expect power outages and said they should have a week’s supply of water and food.

Also on Sunday, China and South Korea reported more infections but spikes in both countries appeared to be tailing off.

China had 49 new confirmed cases, up from the previous day’s 45. Thirty were in Xinjiang in the north-west, where authorities are trying to contain an outbreak focused on the regional capital, Urumqi.

Three cases were found in students who returned from Russia to Wuhan, the southern city where the pandemic began in December. Most anti-disease controls were lifted there after the ruling Communist Party declared victory over the disease in March.

South Korea reported 30 new cases, raising its total to 14,366 with 301 deaths, but said only eight were acquired in the country.

The government had warned earlier that case numbers would rise as South Koreans came home from the Middle East and other places with outbreaks. Authorities say cases from abroad are less threatening because arrivals are quarantined for two weeks.

On Saturday, the leader of a secretive Korean church was arrested in an investigation into whether the group had hampered the anti-virus response after thousands of worshippers were infected in February and March.

Governments worldwide have reported 684,075 deaths and 17.8 million cases, according to data gathered by Johns Hopkins University.

The United States has the world’s biggest number of cases at 4.6 million, or one-quarter of the total, and 154,361 deaths.

On Saturday, South Africa reported 10,107 new cases, raising its total to 503,290.

That put the country fifth behind the United States, Brazil, Russia and India in total cases, though its population of 58 million is much smaller than theirs.

In Europe, the number of new cases reported in Italy dipped below 300 for the first time.

In Austria, an employee in the chancellery tested positive for the virus but didn’t work directly with Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, the Austrian Press Agency reported.

AP