With 18 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed on Wednesday the nation's novel coronavirus tally has reached 978,978.

According to Ministry of Health and Population, in 3070 Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) tests done in the past 24 hours, a total of 18 persons were found infected with SARS-CoV-2, informed the Ministry of Health and Population (MoHP) in its regular update.

Likewise, in 718 antigen tests performed in the last 24 hours 3 are detected positive.

Currently, there are 187 active cases of COVID-19 across the nation of which, one is admitted to various institutional isolation while 186 patients are placed in home isolation.

Meanwhile, 16 COVID-19 patients receiving treatment in institutional isolation or staying in home isolation recovered from the infection in the last 24 hours. Nepal has now recorded 966839 cases of recovery, and the recovery rate is at 98.8 per cent.

The MoHP on Wednesday reported no COVID-19 related fatalities to the nation's COVID-19 death toll, which has now reached 11,952.