MOSCOW, May 6. /TASS/. Russia overtook Germany on Wednesday for the number of officially confirmed COVID-19 cases, moving to the fifth place in the world, according to data analyzed by TASS correspondents.

Russia has confirmed a total of 165,929 coronavirus cases, the anti-coronavirus crisis center reported on Wednesday. Germany has recorded 164,807 cases, according to the Robert Koch Institute.

France is ranked seventh with 132,967 cases, according to official reports. However, AFP news agency reported that some 170,551 cases have been registered in the republic since the start of the pandemic, which were not included in the official statistics.

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 3,700,000 people have been infected worldwide and more than 258,000 deaths have been reported. In addition, so far, over 1,200,000 individuals have recovered from the illness across the globe.