Health workers collect information before taking COVID-19 tests for people living in Nghĩa Đô Ward, Hà Nội's Cầu Giấy District. The city is ramping up testing after dozens of new infections were reported daily in the last few days. VNA/VNS Photo Vũ Sinh

HÀ NỘI — Việt Nam recorded the biggest daily increase in coronavirus cases on Friday with 10,657 new infections including seven imported cases and 10,650 locally-transmitted ones, the Ministry of Health announced.

A further 390 new deaths were announced on Friday, bringing the total number of fatalities to 7,540.

The southern province of Bình Dương, the country’s second-largest COVID-19 hotspot, logged the highest number of new infections on Friday with 4,223 cases.

HCM City, the largest COVID-19 hotspot in Việt Nam today reported 3,375 new cases.

In the past 24 hours, Bình Dương’s infections increased by 968 cases while HCM City’s infections saw a decline of 1,050 cases.

Other locally-transmitted cases were also detected in Đồng Nai (686), Long An (495), Tiền Giang (367), Đà Nẵng (167), Đồng Tháp (156), Cần Thơ (147), Khánh Hòa (147), Tây Ninh (122), An Giang (111), Hà Nội (72), Nghệ An (61), Thừa Thiên Huế (61), Bến Tre (59), Bà Rịa - Vũng Tàu (57), Đắk Lắk (56), Trà Vinh (47), Bình Thuận (29), Phú Yên (27), Vĩnh Long (23), Bắc Giang (18), Quảng Nam (17), Hà Tĩnh (15), Kiên Giang (14), Bình Định (14), Bình Phước (11), Bắc Ninh (10), Gia Lai (10), Quảng Ngãi (9), Cà Mau (7), Lạng Sơn (7), Quảng Bình (7), Lâm Đồng (4), Bạc Liêu (4), Ninh Thuận (4), Thanh Hóa (3), Ninh Bình (2), Sơn La (2), Lào Cai (1), Quảng Trị (1), Hà Nam (1) and Hưng Yên (1).

Of the local cases, 6,132 cases were detected in the community outside of locked-down areas or concentrated quarantine areas.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country early last year, Việt Nam has confirmed 323,268 infections.

Since the fourth wave of the pandemic that started late April, the number of infections in the country reached 319,209 cases, of those 130,041 cases were given the all-clear including 12,756 reported on Friday.

Of the COVID-19 patients under treatment, 666 are in intensive care units while 24 others require life support equipment ECMO.

Of the 390 deaths relating to COVID-19 announced on Friday, 312 are in HCM City, 41 in Bình Dương, eight in Long An, seven in Đồng Nai, seven in Tiền Giang, three in Khánh Hòa, three in Sóc Trăng, two in Cần Thơ, while Hà Nội, Bà Rịa - Vũng Tàu, Bến Tre, Bình Thuận, Hải Dương , Nam Định and Trà Vinh each reported one death.

Việt Nam has reported 7,540 deaths relating to COVID-19, accounting for 2.3 per cent of the country’s total infections.

So far, 16,306,199 people have been vaccinated, of those 1,336,372 people have been given two doses. VNS