Mexico City, August 10 (RHC)-- Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has defended his government's record fighting the coronavirus and ruled out a change in strategy after the official death toll surged past 50,000.

The Latin American nation of 128 million recently overtook Britain to become the third hardest-hit country in terms of total virus deaths, after Brazil and the United States.  

But Lopez Obrador said that in terms of deaths relative to population size, "we have not been so hard hit," and on that basis, Mexico ranks fifth in the Americas, behind the U.S., Brazil, Chile and Peru.    

"And if we compare ourselves with Europe, there are more deaths in Spain, France and England than in Mexico," he said.