Egypt reported 331 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, bringing the total infection tally to 289,684 since the outbreak began in February 2020, said the Health Ministry in its daily coronavirus update statement.

The ministry also reported in its statement 10 new deaths, bringing the total number of deaths from the virus to 16,776.

The statement added that 439 patients have been discharged after recovering from the virus, bringing the total number of recoveries to 241,415.

Egypt’s daily infections have been on an upward curve since early-August with numbers expected to rise throughout September, according to the country's health officials.

Last week, the Presidential Advisor for Health Affairs Mohamed Awad Tag El-Din stated in media statements that “the fourth wave has started in Egypt” given the continuous daily increase in the number of detected cases since a while.

The government has been ramping up efforts to widen the vaccination coverage in order to achieve its planned target of around 40 million citizens by the end of 2021.

As of 27 August, up to 8.7 million vaccine doses have been administered in Egypt with 3 million individuals fully vaccinated, according to the World Health Organization(WHO).

Tens of shipments compromising millions of the Sinopharm, Sinovac, Sputnik, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines have arrived since the beginning of the country’s vaccination campaign in January.

Egypt started locally manufacturing the WHO-approved Sinovac coronavirus vaccine— which was granted an emergency use license by the Egyptian Drug Authority (EDA) on 23 August — in June, with around 15 to 18.5 million doses expected to be produced per month.