Half of Moscow’s 12 million residents have had Covid-19, six times the official figures, according to the city’s mayor.
In an interview with news outlet Rossiya-1, Mayor of Moscow Sergei Sobyanin said the number was based on city hall ‘analysis and research’.
It puts the number of those infected at over six times the officially recorded 925,000 cases in the city since the beginning of the pandemic.
Sobyanin added that less than 1% of recorded cases were reinfections.
It comes as Russia confirmed 17,648 new coronavirus cases and 437 deaths on Monday, bringing its total cases and deaths to 3,868,087 and 73,619 respectively.
Units of a temporary Covid-19 facility of Hospital No 67 at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
A canteen for medical workers at the temporary COVID-19 facility at Krylatskoye Ice Palace. Over 100 medical staff are working at the facility, which provides more than 1,300 hospital beds equipped with oxygen tanks
A doctor and patients do Tai Chi breathing exercises at a temporary COVID-19 facility of Hospital No 67 at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
It comes as images show scores of patients being treated in the city’s temporary hospitals.
Photographs reveal the interior of Moscow’s Krylatskoye Ice Palace, usually used for ice and speed skating events, into a temporary hospital for patients with Covid-19.
A doctor and patients were pictured undertaking Tai Chi breathing exercises at the temporary facility.
Patients do Tai Chi breathing exercises at a temporary COVID-19 facility of Hospital No 67 at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
Patients do Tai Chi breathing exercises. Over 100 medical staff are working at the facility
Units of a temporary COVID-19 facility of Hospital No 67 at Krylatskoye Ice Palace. A doctor and patients were pictured undertaking Tai Chi breathing exercises at the temporary facility
An ambulance vehicle is parked outside an admissions department of the temporary Covid-19 facility
Over 100 medical staff are working at the facility, which provides more than 1,300 hospital beds equipped with oxygen tanks.
Russia said Monday that its economy contracted by 3.1 percent in 2020 as the oil producing nation was hit by coronavirus lockdowns and a plunge in global crude prices.
The drop was less severe than Russian authorities had expected however, as the central bank had forecast a contraction of about 4.0 percent.
A pulse oximeter is pictured on a patient’s finger at an intensive care unit of a temporary COVID-19 facility of Hospital No 67 at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
A medical worker takes a nasal swab for COVID-19 infection at the facility on February 1
A medical worker admits a patient to a temporary COVID-19 facility at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
The Rosstat statistics agency attributed the drop to ‘restrictions imposed to combat the coronavirus and the fall in global demand for energy resources’.
The 3.1 percent drop, a first estimate, was also a relatively good result compared with many European countries that reintroduced lockdowns when a second wave of infections surged late last year.
Spain saw an 11 percent drop, France 8.3 percent and Germany 5.0 percent.
Russian authorities imposed a six-week lockdown in the spring.
Patients are seen at an intensive care unit of a temporary COVID-19 facility at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
A medical worker is seen at a temporary COVID-19 facility at Krylatskoye Ice Palace. A sign reads ‘Biological Hazard’
A patient is seen in a unit of a temporary COVID-19 facility at Krylatskoye Ice Palace
However they ruled out another lockdown even though the country was battered by a second wave of infections late in the year.
Rosstat said the Russian economy’s largest losses were recorded in the hospitality, transport, culture and sport sectors.
Although Rosstat did not publish quarterly figures, the economy is expected to have rebounded by 7.4 percent in the last three months of the year following a steep drop from April through September.
Before the pandemic hit Russia in March, its economy had grown by 1.6 percent in the first quarter from the same period in 2019.