GENEVA, October 6. /TASS/. The highly contagious coronavirus Delta strain has increased its spread to 192 countries and territories over the past week. The spread of Alpha, Beta and Gamma variants has also increased, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported on Wednesday.

Experts classify the Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Delta strains as "variants of concern" (VOCs). "As surveillance activities to detect SARS-CoV-2 variants are strengthened at national and subnational levels, including through the strengthening of genomic sequencing capacities, the number of countries/areas/territories <…> reporting VOCs continues to increase," the weekly epidemiological update said. It is emphasized that the reports of the Delta variant were received from 192 countries. The Delta strain was first detected in India in October 2020.

According to data published in the WHO epidemiological update, the Alpha variant that was first detected in the UK in September 2020 is currently present in 195 countries and territories (two new countries since last week). The Beta strain detected in South Africa last August is present in 145 countries (three new countries) and 99 countries (four new countries) have reported cases of the Gamma variant first recorded in Brazil last September.

According to the WHO, as of October 5, since the beginning of the pandemic there have been 235,175,106 confirmed coronavirus cases with 4,806,841 fatalities worldwide. The US is in first place in terms of the confirmed coronavirus cases reported to the WHO with 43,401,318 infections, followed by India (33,853,048), Brazil (21,468,121), the UK (7,934,940) and Russia (7,637,427). In terms of fatalities, the US is also in the lead with 696,732 deaths, followed by Brazil (597,948), India (449,260), Mexico (278,803) and Russia (211,696).