The health ministry confirmed on Saturday Covid-19 infections had climbed by 10,611 to 155,939.

Brazil is the sixth country in the world to see its death toll from the virus exceed 10,000. Only the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain and France have lost more people to the disease, according to the independent tally kept by a team at Johns Hopkins University.

Nearly 40 per cent of infected people in Brazil have recovered, the health ministry said in its latest bulletin.

The number of active cases is 83,627.

Sao Paulo state, which is home to roughly 42 million of Brazil's 210 million people, accounts for more than a third of Covid-19 deaths in the country and upwards of half the current cases.

The pandemic is also having a major impact in Rio de Janeiro state, where 1,653 people have perished from coronavirus.

With hospitals in Rio city overwhelmed, authorities moved on Saturday to activate a 400-bed field hospital set up inside the iconic Maracana soccer stadium.

The Brazilian response to the pandemic has been uneven. The governors of Rio and Sao Paulo states moved quickly to lay down restrictions and have continued to extend those measures despite vociferous opposition from right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, who dismisses Covid-19 as a "measly flu" and has repeatedly flouted social-distancing guidelines by mingling with his supporters on the streets.

Australian Associated Press