Photo: Agencies

TEHRAN, Dec. 3 (Xinhua) -- Iran reported on Thursday 13,922 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, bringing the tally of infections in the country to 1,003,494.

Among the newly infected people, 1,921 had to be hospitalized, Sima Sadat Lari, spokeswoman for Iran's Ministry of Health and Medical Education, was quoted as saying by the ministry's website.

Sadat Lari said at her daily briefing that 358 new deaths related to the coronavirus were registered, raising the death toll from the epidemic in the country to 49,348.

She added that 699,315 COVID-19 patients have so far recovered or been released from Iranian hospitals, and 5,824 others are currently in critical condition.

A total of 6,256,715 laboratory tests for the coronavirus have been carried out in Iran so far. Currently, 64 Iranian counties are on red alert over a high risk of infection, 278 others are on orange alert, and 106 are on yellow alert, the spokeswoman noted.