RIYADH — Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Health recorded Thursday 253 new coronavirus cases over the past 24 hours, marking a slight increase as compared to the past few days. The single-day virus-related deaths, however, continued to drop with just 3 reported over the past 24 hours. This brings the total number of confirmed infections in the Kingdom to 367,276 and fatalities to 6,366 respectively. The ministry also reported 208 new recoveries over the past 24 hours, raising the total number of people free from the deadly virus to 358,753, with the recovery rate reaching 97.67. The Riyadh region continued to record the highest number of infections with 85 cases, followed by the Eastern region with 66 and the Makkah region with 50 cases. The remaining cases were detected in different other regions of the Kingdom. With the slight increase in new COVID-19 cases over the past few days, the active cases in Saudi Arabia also rose to 2,157, out of which 362 were critical.