India's official coronavirus death toll leapt by more than 2,000 to reach 11,903 on Wednesday as Germany advised its nationals to consider leaving the country because of growing health risks.

Iran Press/ Asia: Mumbai revised its toll up by 862 to 3,165 because of unspecified accounting "discrepancies" while New Delhi saw a record jump of more than 400 deaths, taking its total to more than 1,800.

It was not immediately clear how many of the deaths had occurred in the past 24 hours and how many were from adjustments over a longer period, AFP reported.

The pandemic has badly hit India's densely populated major cities and Chennai ordered a new lockdown from Friday because of a surge in cases.

Elsewhere, lockdowns are gradually being eased because of the damage they have caused the economy.

India, the fourth-worst-hit country in the world by cases, has now recorded 354,065 cases, according to official figures.

Experts say the figure is much higher and have called for more widespread testing.

With hospitals in several cities now struggling to keep up with the pandemic, Germany became the first country to warn its nationals about staying in the country.

The global death toll nears  445,986 with 8,257,885 confirmed cases, according to the World Health Organization.

COVID-19 was first detected in China's Wuhan in late December and has since spread across the world. 

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