BEIJING, March 3 (Xinhua) -- China has stepped up efforts to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. Here are the latest developments:

-- China's finance ministry said Tuesday that all levels of government have allocated 108.75 billion yuan (15.63 billion U.S. dollars) of funds as of Monday to fight against the novel coronavirus outbreak.

--The recovery rate of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patients in China's hard-hit Hubei Province surged from 7.14 percent on Feb. 12 to 53.81 percent Monday, local authorities said Tuesday.

-- The number of daily new infections outside the outbreak epicenter of Hubei Province was around 10 for the past five days, said Mi Feng, spokesperson for the National Health Commission, at a press conference.

The number of daily new suspected cases has remained under 100 over the past four days, and nearly 3,000 recovered patients were discharged from hospitals each day in the past six days, according to Mi.

-- Chinese TV show creators are encouraged to draw inspiration from the ongoing battle against the novel coronavirus outbreak and the targeted poverty alleviation campaign, the National Radio and Television Administration said Tuesday.

-- Leading U.S. chip manufacturer Intel Corporation and Chinese tech firms Lenovo and BGI Genomics announced Tuesday they are pooling their resources to investigate the genomic characteristics of the novel coronavirus. The research is expected to lead a path to a vaccine and immunotherapies for the pathogen.

-- Chinese health authority said Tuesday it received reports of 125 newly confirmed cases of novel coronavirus infection and 31 deaths on Monday on the Chinese mainland.

All the deaths were in Hubei Province, according to the National Health Commission.

-- On Monday, 2,742 people were discharged from hospital after recovery from novel coronavirus infection, while the number of severe cases decreased by 304 to 6,806.

-- The overall confirmed cases on the mainland had reached 80,151 by the end of Monday, including 30,004 patients who were still being treated, 47,204 patients who had been discharged after recovery, and 2,943 people who had died of the disease.

-- By the end of Monday, 100 confirmed cases including two deaths had been reported in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), 10 confirmed cases in the Macao SAR, and 41 in Taiwan, including one death.

Thirty-six patients in Hong Kong, eight in Macao and 12 in Taiwan had been discharged from hospital after recovery.

-- "About 80 to 90 percent of the newly confirmed infections in Wuhan were previously suspected cases," said Liang Wannian, head of the Chinese expert panel on outbreak response and disposal.

"These cases are all under our control," Liang said.

Some new infections are also related to close contacts of the confirmed cases. The China-World Health Organization joint expert team said about 1 to 5 percent of close contacts have later been confirmed to have the disease.

-- All the passengers and crew members aboard flight CA440 tested negative for the novel coronavirus after their flight landed in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality from Seoul on Sunday.

Four people on the flight, with 10 crew members and 79 passengers including 22 from the Republic of Korea, were found to have feverish symptoms during entry quarantine.

The four passengers, all Chongqing citizens, were sent to a designated hospital for treatment. The rest were under medical observation.

Nucleic acid tests were negative for all aboard. Another test will be conducted on the four feverish passengers after 24 hours.