China's death toll from Tropical Storm Bilis rose to 530 on Saturday, more than a week after the storm hit, as officials in southern Guangdong province and the Guangxi region reported an additional 48 deaths, state media said.

Guangdong's toll jumped to 106 after 43 additional deaths were reported from the storm, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

A man watch his land submerged in floods caused by Typhoon Bilis in Ping He county, east China's Fujian province July 16, 2006. Rainstorms and winds unleashed by Bilis whip Fujian province Sunday, leaving 43 dead and 24 others missing. The directe ecnomic losses hit 3 billion yuan (US$375 million). A total of 154 are killed around south east China, according to state press. [Newsphoto]

In the Guangxi region, five more deaths were reported, bringing the toll there to 35, it said.

Bilis slammed into China's southeastern coast on July 14, causing massive flooding and triggering mudslides that swept away thousands of homes and forced nearly 3 million to flee their hometowns.

Hardest hit was Hunan province, where 346 people have been confirmed dead and another 89 were missing, according to Xinhua. Elsewhere, 43 were killed in the coastal Fujian province.

Luo Xiwu, a Communist Party official from Zixing, was quoted by Xinhua as saying Friday the disaster caused a "breakdown of communication and traffic systems," which made it hard for authorities to collect information on deaths and damage.

"The officials did not shift their work focus from rescue and relief to death toll head count and damage investigation until rainstorms stopped and floods receded," Luo said.

However, a journalist from state television apparently uncovered that officials in Zixing, a village in Hunan, had dramatically underreported the deaths there, Xinhua said. A death toll of 197 was later confirmed for Zixing but Xinhua did not give its initial figure.

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