SAO PAULO, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- Brazil on Monday said its COVID-19 death toll surpassed 121,000 deaths after 553 more patients died in the previous 24 hours, which took the total number of fatalities to 121,381.
In the same 24-hour period, tests detected 45,961 new cases of infection, pushing the total caseload to 3,908,272, according to the Ministry of Health.
On a positive note, Brazil saw its fifth consecutive day of less than 1,000 fatalities from the novel coronavirus.
However, Brazil's southeast state of Sao Paulo, the most affected by the pandemic, on Monday surpassed 30,000 COVID-19 deaths, overtaking Spain in the number of fatalities.
Also Monday, Brazil's Ministry of Health announced it appointed Lauricio Monteiro Cruz, who worked for the local government of the capital Brasilia, as director of the Department of Immunizations and Communicable Diseases.
Brazil has the world's second-largest outbreak in both number of cases and deaths, after the United States.