Australia on Sunday (1/3/2020) morning confirmed the first death of a corona virus patient in a hospital in the City of Perth, according to health official Andrew Robertson.

The 78-year-old man was quarantined after being evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan, among more than 150 Australians who were picked up from the ship.

“We express our condolences to the patient’s family and regretted he was the first victim of the corona virus in Australia,” the head of the health service of the State of Western Australia, Robertson, told media crews.

The man’s wife also contracted the corona virus, but now his condition is stable, authorities say.

The number of cases infected with COVID-19 in Australia reached 25 cases, based on the latest government data.

On Saturday Australia said it would ban foreign tourists from Iran because of the spread of the virus in the Islamic Republic.

There are more than 85,000 cases of COVID-19 infection worldwide, mostly in China, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Meanwhile, outside China the corona virus has infected 53 countries with more than 6,000 cases and 86 deaths.