MOSCOW, June 16. /TASS/. A total of 8,248 new COVID-19 cases have been identified across Russia over the past 24 hours, which takes the overall number of those who are known to have contracted the virus to 545,458, the anti-coronavirus center told the media on Tuesday. The daily growth rate was 1.5% against 1.6% one day before.

Moscow accounts for 1,416 newly-exposed cases, the Moscow Region, for 694, the Irkutsk Region, for 319, St. Petersburg, for 234, and the Sverdlovsk Region, for 231.

In the group of the newly identified COVID-19 patients 2,580 are asymptomatic. Currently 243,868 people across Russia are ill.