MOSCOW (REUTERS, AFP) - Russia reported 25,033 new Covid-19 cases on Sunday (July 11), including 5,410 in Moscow, taking the official national tally since the pandemic began to 5,783,333.

       The government coronavirus task force said that 749 people had died of coronavirus-linked causes in the past 24 hours, pushing the national death toll to 143,002.

       The federal statistics agency has kept a separate death toll. It said last Friday it had recorded around 290,000 deaths related to Covid-19 between April 2020 and May this year.

       As of Saturday, just 18.9 million of Russia's population of some 146 million people had been fully vaccinated, according to the Gogov website, which tallies Covid-19 data from the regions.

       In Moscow, the epicentre of Russia's outbreak, just 1.8 million of the city's some 12 million people had been fully vaccinated despite free jabs having been available since December.

       Authorities have faced a vaccine-sceptic population, with an independent poll this week showing that 54 per cent of Russians do not plan on getting a Covid-19 jab.

       But the pace of the vaccination drive has nonetheless picked up after Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin last month mandated that 60 per cent of service industry workers must be fully inoculated by mid-August, with a number of Russian regions since following suit.

       Last Friday, Mr Sobyanin said 3.5 million Muscovites will have received at least their first dose of a vaccine by the end of the weekend.

       The mayor has also ordered offices in the Russian capital to send home a third of their unvaccinated employees and restaurants to allow inside only patrons who have been vaccinated or infected in the past six months.

       The Kremlin, however, has rejected mandatory vaccinations for all groups of the population as well as suggestions of reimposing a nationwide lockdown.

       Russia reports record high daily Covid-19 deaths

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