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An American became the first confirmed non-Chinese victim of the new coronavirus on Saturday while a Japanese man also died with symptoms consistent with the disease, France 24 reported.

According to the source, the 60-year old U.S. citizen diagnosed with coronavirus died at Jinyintan Hospital in China’s Wuhan, the epicentre of the virus outbreak, on February 6, a US embassy spokesman in Beijing said. A Japanese man hospitalised with pneumonia in Wuhan also died after suffering flu-like symptoms consistent with the new coronavirus, Japan’s foreign ministry said.

The total death toll in mainland China rose by 86 to 722 on Saturday, according to Chinese authorities, and is poised to pass the 774 deaths recorded globally during the 2002-2003 pandemic of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), another coronavirus that jumped from animals to humans in China.

During the SARS outbreak between November 2002 and July 2003, the number of reported cases was 8,098, suggesting a far lower transmission rate than the latest coronavirus, but a higher mortality rate.