The Chinese government has issued a warning about the outbreak. Photo / Getty Images

The Chinese embassy in Kazakhstan has warned of a deadly "unknown pneumonia" after the country reported a spike in pneumonia cases since June.

Iran Press/Asia: "The death rate of this disease is much higher than the novel coronavirus.

The country's health departments are conducting comparative research into the pneumonia virus, but have yet to identify the virus," the embassy said in a warning to Chinese citizens in the country.

While the Chinese embassy described the illness as "unknown pneumonia", Kazakhstani officials and media have only said it is pneumonia, South China Morning Post reported.

It was not clear why the Chinese embassy had described the illness as "unknown" or what information it had about pneumonia.

The Chinese embassy said that so far there have been nearly 500 pneumonia cases in the three places, with more than 30 people in a critical condition.

Kazakhstan announced a state of emergency on March 16 to tackle the spread of Covid-19. The lockdown was lifted on May 11, but restrictions and quarantine measures have been reimposed in some areas after the surge in pneumonia cases.

Kazakhstan's President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said in a televised address on Wednesday that the situation was still serious and it was too early to relax restrictions.

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