Hospitals are struggling to cope as a highly infectious COVID variant ravages the country. There are questions over vaccine efficacy, and one expert says other strains "will escape."

The recent spikes in cases have led to growing fears of a "second wave" of the pandemic, as countries that seemingly passed the peak of infections some months ago experience new outbreaks.

Brazil has the third-highest number of novel coronavirus cases in the world, according to official figures released Monday, a troubling surge for a country struggling to respond to the pandemic.

With 254,220 confirmed cases, Brazil has now surpassed Britain, Spain and Italy in the past 72 hours on the list of total infections, and is behind only the United States (1.5 million) and Russia (290,000).

Brazil has registered 16,792 COVID-19 deaths, the sixth-highest toll in the world.

But experts say under-testing means the real figures could be 15 times higher or more.

Get the latest headlines: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/


Telegraph.co.uk and YouTube.com/TelegraphTV are websites of The Telegraph, the UK's best-selling quality daily newspaper providing news and analysis on UK and world events, business, sport, lifestyle and culture.

Media reports say rightwing populist is showing symptoms of disease

President Donald Trump on Sunday suspended travel from Brazil, which has emerged as a major new hotspot in the coronavirus pandemic, the White House said.