Brazil registered 595 additional deaths from COVID-19 on Monday, taking its death toll to 225,099, the country's Health Ministry said.

In the past day, the South American country also reported 24,591 new coronavirus cases, taking its national caseload to 9,229,322.

Pandemic hotspot Sao Paulo, the most populated state in the country, is in red alert due to a growing outbreak, and has banned non-essential activities from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. and on weekends.

So far, the state has registered 53,090 deaths and 1,779,722 cases.

However, authorities on Monday announced transmission rates have improved, so restrictions will be reviewed and possibly relaxed.

"In the third week of January we had more than 6,800 patients in intensive care and today we have 5,800. There are about 1,000 fewer beds being occupied and with that we managed to stabilize the number of infected and deaths," Jean Gorinchteyn, Sao Paulo's secretary of health, said at a press conference.

Meanwhile, the northern state of Amazonas, whose health system collapsed in January due to a lack of oxygen, said it has airlifted 406 patients to 16 other states for treatment.

Amazonas registered 2,832 deaths in January alone, out of a total death toll of 8,266 since the start of the pandemic.

So far, more than 2 million Brazilians in high-risk groups have been vaccinated against COVID-19 since the start of immunization, the ministry said.

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