Fire breaks out at Moscow coronavirus hospital, one dead

The hospital, located in northwestern Moscow, had been assigned by the authorities as one of the medical facilities treating coronavirus patients in the Russian capital.

The emergency ministry said the RIA news agency that the fire erupted in a patient’s room, without providing further details. The fire has since been put out, stated by the authorities.

Sergei Sobyanin, the mayor of Moscow, addressed on Twitter that all patients had been transferred to other hospitals.

“The causes of this incident will be thoroughly examined,” Sobyanin wrote.

Moscow and several other regions have been on lockdown since late March to stem the spread of the coronavirus, which has so far infected nearly 200,000 people and caused more than 1,800 deaths in Russia.

More than half of the country’s cases and deaths have been reported in Moscow, a city of 12.7 million.

The number of Russian coronavirus cases this week overtook French and German infections to become the fifth-highest in the world.