MOSCOW, July 3. /TASS/. Russia has provided personal protective equipment and 320 coronavirus testing systems to Latin American countries, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday.

"On July 2, an Azur Air flight sent to repatriate Russian nationals from Caracas, Quito, San Jose and other places, delivered a shipment of Russian humanitarian aid to Central American region to help combat the coronavirus," the statement reads.

According to the Foreign Ministry, Russia "provided the region with 320 testing systems to detect COVID-19, designed to conduct 32,000 tests." Requests for assistance had particularly come from Nicaragua’s Vice President Rosario Murillo, Central American Integration System Secretary General Vinicio Cerezo and the government of Costa Rica.

The Russian Foreign Ministry added that the shipment also contained over 37,000 pieces of personal protective equipment.

Coronavirus pandemic

In late December 2019, Chinese officials notified the World Health Organization (WHO) about the outbreak of a previously unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, in central China. Since then, cases of the novel coronavirus - named COVID-19 by the WHO - have been reported in every corner of the globe, including Russia.

On March 11, 2020, the WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. According to the latest statistics, over 11,000,000 people have been infected worldwide and more than 524,000 deaths have been reported. In addition, so far, over 6,172,000 individuals have recovered from the illness across the globe.