Hard-hit Brazil's coronavirus death toll soared in March, its deadliest month yet in the pandemic, with 66,573 people killed by Covid-19, more than double the previous record.
The South American country, whose hospitals have been pushed dangerously close to collapse by a new surge of severe cases, has now recorded a total of 321,515 deaths from Covid-19, the health ministry said - a toll second only to that of the United States.
The health ministry recorded more than twice as many fatalities in March as Brazil's second-deadliest month of the pandemic, July 2020, when there were 32,881 deaths. "Never in Brazilian history have we seen a single event kill so many people" in one month, said doctor Miguel Nicolelis, former coordinator of the