The death toll of China's massive earthquake increased by four overnight to 69,180 as of Thursday noon, the State Council Information Office said.

The number of the injured remained at 374,008 and people reported missing dropped by nine to 17,406 after the 8.0-magnitude quake rocked southwestern Sichuan Province and neighboring regions on May 12.

Hospitals had treated 95,912 injured people as of Thursday noon, of whom 80,359 had been discharged and 12,922 were still in hospital.

By Wednesday, about 1.43 million quake survivors had been found and evacuated.

Relief supplies continued to pour into the quake zone. As of Thursday noon, about 1.49 million tents, 4.87 million quilts, 14.1 million garments, 1.22 million tonnes of fuel oil and 2.6 million tonnes of coal had been sent.

The office said as of Wednesday, relief workers had built 215,600 temporary houses and another 42,100 were being installed, while the materials for 90,000 houses had arrived in the affected areas.

As of Thursday noon, the government disaster relief fund had reached 54.22 billion yuan (7.75 billion U.S. dollars), including 49.55 billion yuan from the central budget and 4.68 billion yuan from the local budget.

About 19.55 billion yuan of the central budget funds was allocated for disaster relief and 30 billion yuan for reconstruction.

In addition, domestic and foreign donations had reached 46.38 billion yuan in cash and goods, among which 15.57 billion yuan had been forwarded to the quake-hit areas.

In the 24 hours that ended Thursday noon, 284 aftershocks were monitored in the quake zone, according to the China Earthquake Administration.

Two of the tremors were above 4.0 magnitude but under 5.0, while the rest were at or below 3.9 magnitude.

A total of 13,096 aftershocks had been detected since May 12.

According to the Ministry of Transport, 52,190 km of damaged highways had been restored, up 38 km over the previous report, while 53,294 km of roads were destroyed in the quake.

By Thursday noon, 5,944 state-owned enterprises and large-scale enterprises with annual revenue above 5 million yuan had resumed operation.

Production at another 499 companies of the same scale was still suspended, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said.

And 6,237 of the 8,426 quake-damaged water plants have been repaired, according to the Ministry of Water Resources.

The quake had damaged 47,643 km of tap water pipeline, of which 40,482 km had been restored.

As of Thursday noon, power supply had been restored in 121 of the 125 towns, which suffered a cut-off in the quake zone.

(Xinhua News Agency June 20, 2008)