The number of new cases of COVID-19 reported worldwide fell by 16% last week to 2.7 million, the World Health Organization said.

The number of new deaths reported also fell 10% week-on-week, to 81,000, the WHO said in its weekly epidemiological update, using figures up to Sunday.

Five of the six WHO regions of the world reported a double-digit percentage decline in new cases, with only the Eastern Mediterranean showing a rise, of 7%.

New case numbers dropped 20% last week in Africa and in the Western Pacific, 18% in Europe, 16% in the Americas and 13 per cent in southeast Asia.

WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that the number of new cases had declined for a fifth consecutive week, dropping by almost half, from more than five million cases in the week of January 4.