PARIS, France (AFP) — More than 65 million cases of the novel coronavirus have been detected worldwide, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP at 0750 GMT on Friday.

In total, 65,084,394 cases, leading to 1,504,984 deaths, have been recorded around the world since the virus emerged in China late last year.

The rise can be explained only in part by increased testing, with Europe and the United States confronted by a major new wave of infections.

Europe, with more than 19 million confirmed cases including 430,000 fatalities, remains the region with the most infections.

Over the past week, almost 1.7 million new infections have been recorded in 52 European countries, a similar level to the prior seven days.

The United States has recorded over 14 million infections (including 276,000 deaths) — a fifth of the global total.

The number of positive cases continues to rise at an unprecedented rate — more than 210,000 were registered in the US on Thursday alone, a record since the start of the pandemic, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Overall, the United States and Canada has declared 14.5 million cases with at least 288,705 deaths.

Latin America and the Caribbean has registered 13.3 million infections with 453,974 deaths, followed by Asia (12.6 million, 197,559), the Middle East (3.4 million, 80,163), Africa (2.2 million, 52,825) and Oceania (30,388, 942).