Turkey reports 55 daily COVID-19 deaths
Tourists wearing masks to protect from the spread of the coronavirus walk at the Aegean Sea town of Ayvalık, Turkey, Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2020. (AP Photo)


The Turkish Health Ministry on Wednesday reported 1,673 new cases and 55 deaths from COVID-19 within the past 24 hours.

According to daily data released by the ministry, the new infections were spotted in more than 110,000 COVID-19 tests carried out in the past day, bringing the total number of cases in the country to 284,943.

The death toll from coronavirus so far has also increased to 6,837 with 55 new fatalities.

Meanwhile, the total number of people recovered from COVID-19 has increased to 254,188 with 943 additional patients declared free of coronavirus.

Shortly after the daily data was published, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca urged citizens yet again to follow precautions to prevent a further rise in infections.

"More than 8 million (COVID-19) tests have been done so far. For today, we had 1,673 new cases that were found in more than 110,000 tests conducted. We will be stronger against the outbreak together if we all pay attention to the precautions," he wrote on Twitter.

Turkey has been seeing a resurgence in coronavirus infections for the past few weeks, with daily infection rates slowly but steadily climbing.

In an effort to prevent a further increase in infection rates, the Interior Ministry on Tuesday declared wearing masks outside as mandatory across all provinces. The order previously applied to only the worst-hit cities, with many provinces only requiring mask use in often crowded streets only.