Europe’s migrant crisis is getting worse — with more people trying to escape to new homes via the Mediterranean Sea, more dying as a result and more countries, including some long welcoming to refugees, taking fresh steps to control the influx.

The International Organization for Migration reported Friday that more than 55,500 migrants have crossed the Mediterranean into Europe in the first 28 days of January. This after a year in which more than 1 million migrants were “irregular arrivals” in Europe.

Others, though, did not make it. IOM counted 3,722 people dead or missing in 2015 in the same sea. So far this year, 244 are known to have died in the Mediterranean, most when attempting to cross the Aegean Sea from Turkey to Greece, and at least 15 more have died after reaching European shores. Deaths on this route are increasing at an alarming rate,” group spokesman Joel Millman told reporters Friday.(CNN)…[+]