The Tokyo metropolitan government announced a record 4,058 infections in the past 24 hours. Organizers of the Olympics reported 21 new competition-related COVID-19 cases, bringing the total to 241 as of July 1.
A day earlier, Japan extended its state of emergency for Tokyo until the end of August and extended it to three nearby prefectures and the western prefecture of Osaka.
Malaysia, one of the hotbeds of the disease, reported 17,786 cases of coronavirus on Saturday, a record number.
More than 100 people gathered in the center of the capital, Kuala Lumpur, to express their dissatisfaction with the government’s handling of the pandemic and call for the resignation of Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin.
Thailand also reported a daily record of 18,912 new coronavirus infections, bringing the total cases to 597,287. The country also reported 178 new deaths.
The government said the Delta variant accounted for more than 60% of cases in the country and 80% of cases in Bangkok.
The Delta variant is not necessarily more lethal than other variants, but it is much more transmissible, Supakit Sirilak, director general of Thailand’s Department of Medical Sciences, told Reuters.
China is fighting an outbreak of the Delta variant in the eastern city of Nanjing, which originated in airport workers who cleaned a plane that had arrived from Russia.
Nanking has recorded 190 cases of local transmission of the Delta variant since July 20, while nationwide there have been a total of 262 cases, according to figures released on Saturday.
Vietnam, which is dealing with its worst COVID-19 outbreak, also announced tougher measures on Saturday, saying that starting Monday it would impose strict restrictions on movement in 19 cities and provinces in the south of the country for another two weeks.
COVID-19 infections have risen 80% in the past four weeks in most regions of the world, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday.
The Delta variant, first detected in India, is as contagious as chickenpox and far more contagious than the common cold or flu, the US Centers for Disease Control said in an internal document released this week.
The variant can be transmitted even by vaccinated people and cause more serious illness than previous coronavirus strains, according to the CDC document.