Victoria - the epicentre of the country’s latest COVID-19 outbreak - said on Friday it has detected 113 new cases in the past 24 hours, unchanged from the previous day.

Victoria’s case numbers raise hopes that Australia may have contained the spread of COVID-19 after a stringent lockdown of Melbourne.

Australia has now recorded nearly 25,500 COVID-19 infections, while the death toll rose to 584 after 12 people died in Victoria.

Strict lockdown measures have helped ease the daily rise of COVID-19 infections in Victoria after the state hit a one-day high of more than 700 cases about three weeks ago.

Reporting by Renju Jose