PHNOM PENH, March 22 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia's Ministry of Health (MoH) confirmed late Sunday that 31 more people were tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total number of the confirmed cases in the kingdom to 84.

The new patients are 29 French tourists and two Cambodian tour guides, the MoH said in a statement, adding that they are among a group of 36 French tourists who arrived in the coastal province of Preah Sihanouk on March 18 through a tour company and stayed in a hotel there.

All of their samples had been taken for tests at the Pasteur Institute of Cambodia in Phnom Penh after two of them were tested positive on Saturday and the first two French patients were put in quarantine for treatment at the Preah Sihanouk provincial hospital, the statement said.

"Currently, the new 31 patients have been placed in isolation rooms at a hotel (in Preah Sihanouk province) for treatment," MoH's secretary of state and spokeswoman Or Vandine said in the statement.

Cambodia has recorded a total of 84 confirmed cases of COVID-19 to date. Among them are a Chinese national, a Canadian man, a Belgian man, three British nationals, 12 Malaysians, 33 French nationals, and 33 Cambodians. All, but six, are imported cases.

Two of the patients -- a Chinese man and a British woman -- have fully recovered and been discharged from hospitals, as the rest have been quarantined at designated hospitals for treatment, according to the statement.

Ly Sovann, director of the MoH's Communicable Disease Control Department, on Sunday called on citizens, who have just returned from abroad, to self-quarantine at home for 14 days and to contact a hotline if they have any suspicious symptoms.

The call came after thousands of Cambodian workers in Thailand flocked to their hometowns on Sunday, a day before Thailand closes its border checkpoints with the kingdom to stem the virus spread. Enditem

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