The rate of new confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus outside of Hubei Province has decreased in the last few days, said Mi Feng a spokesperson for the China's National Health Commission (NHC) at a regular press briefing on Sunday. 

Read more: Click here for live coverage of this press briefing.

As of Saturday, there were 509 new confirmed cases outside of Hubei, the province at the epicenter of the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. This is 42 percent less than the 890 new confirmed cases nearly a week ago, on February 3. 

This decrease shows that the joint prevention and control mechanism over the epidemic are effective, said Mi.

A total of 37,198 cases of novel coronavirus infection were confirmed on the Chinese mainland as of Saturday, with 811 deaths, according to the NHC.

The updated figures include 89 new deaths and 2,656 new cases that were reported on Saturday. There were also 600 more recovered cases, bringing the total to 2,649.

As of Sunday, a total of 11,921 medical workers have been dispatched to Hubei, in a bid to fight against the epidemic, said the NHC.

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