Seven people have died after a fire broke out in a Romanian intensive care unit for treating COVID-19 patients, the country's third deadly hospital fire under a year.

Patients were forced to jump out of windows from the hospital's lower levels in the coastal city of Constanta as firefighters carried people out.

The country's emergency response unit first announced nine people had died, but Transport Minister Lucian Bode later said there had been a miscommunication between hospital staff and the firefighters.

The blaze was extinguished at around 07:55 GMT, with emergency services having been brought in from nearby counties.

Angry relatives of the patients protested outside the hospital in protest as prosecutors opened an investigation into the causes of the fire.

In February, a fire killed four patients at a coronavirus hospital in the Romanian capital of Bucharest. Last November 10 people died in an intensive care unit at the Piatra Neamt county hospital.

"I am appalled at the tragedy," President Klaus Iohannis said. "It is a new terrible drama which confirms the lacking infrastructure of Romania's healthcare system, placed under unimaginable pressure by the fourth wave of the pandemic."

More than 12,500 coronavirus patients, including 373 children, were being treated in Romanian hospitals on Friday, including 1,391 in intensive care units.

As infections have risen, intensive care units across the country are running out of space in a country which has the second-lowest vaccination rate in the EU. 

Much of Romania's healthcare infrastructure has been characterized as being in need of upgrade, with Friday's tragedy adding to concerns about the safety of the country's hospitals.