54 new cases of Coronavirus have been found in the last 24 hours, making it the highest single-day increase in cases since the pandemic began in Malta last March.

The highest single-day increase of cases prior to today was of 52 cases on 7 April - exactly a month after the first case of Coronavirus was registered in Malta.

Nine recoveries meanwhile were also registered in the last 24 hours.

It means that the number of active cases in Malta now stands at 396 - the highest it has ever been since the pandemic began.  It should however be noted that 101 of those cases are migrants who have no bearing on local transmission of the virus.

The cases include three tracing back to a language school cluster, nine family members of previously known cases and 12 linked to the Paceville cluster, which is now by far the biggest cluster of active cases of the virus.

Health authorities said that the youngest case is one-year-old and the oldest is 75 years old.

1,789 swab tests were carried out in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of swab tests carried out so far up to 141,767.

In their update, the Health Ministry said that "it is recomended that people avoid crowded areas".

The total number of cases in Malta since the pandemic began is now up to 1,089, out of which 684 have recovered and 9 have died.