MOSCOW, June 10. /TASS/. The world’s leaders in terms of the coronavirus infection rates are South American countries, while Russia is in seventh place, Russian State Duma deputy, member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Gennady Onishchenko said at the Russian-Belarusian conference entitled Coronavirus Infection: Fundamental, Clinical and Epidemiological Aspects on Wednesday.

"South American countries are steadily rising to the top of the list. This is true of part of the South American continent and Southern Hemisphere. In terms of intensity Peru is currently number one: 618 cases per 100,000 residents. It is ahead of the US. As for Russia, the intensity of the epidemic is in seventh place," Onishchenko said.

As for the overall number of COVID-19 cases, the United States is first and Russia, third.

In contrast to other airborne infections transmitted from sick to healthy people the contagiousness of COVID-19 is low.

"It is not distinguished by any special pathogenic effects, which may even be weaker than those of certain types of flu. This explains why 40%-60% of the identified cases are asymptomatic," Onishchenko said. He recalled that over the past 15-20 years 700-900 million people had flu every year, but the problem never drew so much attention.

In his opinion the world has encountered what can be described as a "hybrid informational and epidemiological problem."

On March 11, 2020, the WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. According to the latest statistics, over 7,336,200 people have been infected worldwide and more than 414,000 deaths have been reported. In addition, so far, over 3,617,900 individuals have recovered from the illness across the globe.

To date, 493,657 coronavirus cases have been confirmed in Russia, with 252,783 patients having recovered from the disease. Russia’s latest data indicates 6,358 fatalities nationwide. Earlier, the Russian government set up an Internet hotline to keep the public updated on the coronavirus situation.