By TRN Online, Kathmandu, Dec. 28: With 659 new cases of novel coronavirus confirmed on Monday, the national COVID-19 tally has surged to 258,840.

"In 5,578 Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) tests done in the last 24 hours, as many as 659 persons, 252 females and 407 males were found to have been infected with SARS-CoV-2," informed the Ministry of Health and Population (MoHP) in its daily update.

Currently, there are 6,427 active cases of COVID-19, of which 3,022 patients are receiving treatment in institutional isolation and 3,405 are in home isolation.

A total of 254 are admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and 40 are receiving treatment with ventilator facility.

A total of 369 persons, mostly those who had returned from abroad, are placed in quarantine.

Meanwhile, 718 COVID-19 patients receiving treatment institutional isolation or staying in home isolation recovered from the infection in the last 24 hours. Nepal has now recorded 250,581 cases of recoveries and the recovery rate has reached 96.8 per cent.

A total of seven people succumbed to the deadly virus in the last 24 hours and with this, the national COVID-19 related death tally has reached 1,832.