As overall infections overseas surpassed the country's caseload, imported COVID-19 cases keep cropping up in multiple regions on Chinese mainland, disrupting the trend of the epidemic grinding to a halt in China, as the most recent data shows. 

The number of infections on the Chinese mainland rose by 21 over the course of Monday to 80,881, according to data released by the National Health Commission early on Tuesday. 

All but one of the additional cases were imported ones. Beijing saw nine imported cases over the course of Monday, followed by Shanghai with three. Excluding imported cases, regions outside Hubei on the Chinese mainland have reported no infections for the past five days. 

To date, 143 imported cases have been counted, according to the commission. 

The one domestic infection was reported from Wuhan, Hubei province - center of the outbreak - marking the sixth consecutive day of the province counting single-digit increases. The rest of the province has seen no new cases 12 days in a row. 

With 13 further fatalities, a total of 3,226 people have succumbed to the virus on the Chinese mainland, the commission said.

The backlog of treating the infected has been further reduced, with more discharged from hospitals and a further decline of patients that need intensive care. 

Another 930 people were discharged from hospitals on Monday, bringing up the number of recovered Chinese mainland patients to 68,679, the commission said.  

With a daily reduction of 202 patients exhibiting serious symptoms, the number of such patients now stands at 2,830. In total, 8,976 patients are still hospitalized. 

There are now 128 suspected infections on the Chinese mainland, and 45 of them were counted on Monday. 

Among the 681,404 people who have so far been traced as close contacts with the infected, 9,351 are still under medical observation, it said. 

In Hubei, with the latest daily increase of one case in capital Wuhan, the caseload has reached 67,799. To date, the disease had claimed 3,111 lives in the province as of Monday at midnight, the commission said. 

The case count in Wuhan now stands at 50,004. With 11 further deaths, the number of fatalities in the city has reached 2,480. 

The Hong Kong and Macao Special Administrative Regions and Taiwan province have reported a total of 235 confirmed cases, including four deaths in Hong Kong and one death in Taiwan, the commission noted. 

In these regions, 120 patients have been discharged from hospitals.