The World Health Organization on Friday denied having brushed off a Taiwanese warning on human-to-human transmission of the new coronavirus soon after its outbreak in China late last year. 

U.S. health officials made cautiously optimistic noises about coronavirus despite high death tolls Thursday, suggesting Americans might be able to take summer holidays, as falling hospitalization rates hint at a turning point in the battle against COVID-19.

Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte was reportedly ready Friday to extend most measures of Italy's month-long lockdown until early May in order to avoid a second coronavirus wave.

One hundred Italian doctors have died of the novel coronavirus since the pandemic reached the Mediterranean country in February, Italy's FNOMCeO health association said on Thursday.

"The world will never be the same again," has been the oft-repeated refrain since the coronavirus brought the global economy to a juddering halt.

Hairstylist "Ah Ping" is back in business now that Wuhan's coronavirus lockdown has been lifted, but his salon has no customers, only empty chairs and lingering fears over a contagion that continues to haunt the city.

Iran's health ministry on Thursday said 117 new deaths from the novel coronavirus took the total to 4,110 in the country, one of the worst-hit by the disease.

The coronavirus pandemic notched up another round of record death tolls in the United States and Europe, dousing the optimism of US President Donald Trump who insisted there was light at the end of the tunnel.

More than 1.5 million cases of the novel coronavirus have been registered worldwide, according to a tally compiled by AFP at 0530 GMT Thursday from official sources.

France on Wednesday reported 541 more deaths from COVID-19 in hospital over the last 24 hours, bringing its total official toll from the coronavirus epidemic to 10,869.