New fever cases in North Korea stayed below 200-thousand for a second day amid an explosive spread of an illness suspected to be COVID-19.

The North’s official Korean Central News Agency(KCNA) on Monday said that the state emergency epidemic prevention headquarters reported 167-thousand-650 more people with fever symptoms in the 24 hour-period leading up to 6 p.m. Sunday.

The headquarters said the death toll came to 68 after one new death, with the fatality rate standing at zero-point-002 percent.

The KCNA said the new figures raised the total number of fever cases to about two-point-eight million and 82-point-nine percent of them, or some two-point-three million, have recovered. Nearly 480-thousand are receiving treatment.

The KCNA claimed on Sunday that the outbreak is now being controlled stably after the nation saw a surge in fever cases in the beginning.