Global cases of COVID-19 accelerated beyond 17 million on Wednesday night, just four days after the world crossed the 16 million mark.
According to data compiled by worldometers.info, global cases reached 17,147,431 on Wednesday, with 263,367 cases recorded in a 24-hour cycle.
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The death toll stood at 668,771 by Thursday morning.
The United States, Brazil, and India, along with several Latin American countries were responsible for the explosion in COVID-19 cases, data shows. Virus cases in the U.S. have ballooned to 4,554,780 and deaths 153,440.
The country logged another record 1,149 deaths in a 24-hour cycle.
Brazil is the world’s second most affected nation with 2,553,265 cases and deaths soaring to the 100,000 marks. As of Wednesday night, 90,134 Brazilians have died from the virus, with 1,500 new deaths recorded in a single day.
India has 1,584,384 cases, with 35,003 deaths.
Russia, which has signaled it may approve the world’s first vaccine for the virus, has so far reported 828,990 cases and 13,673 deaths.
South Africa, Mexico, Peru, Chile have also reported more fresh cases.
Russia said on Wednesday it would register its Coronavirus COVID-19 vaccine by August 10 to Augusta 12.
The vaccine is being developed by Moscow’s Gamaleya Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, with financial aid from the Russian Direct Investment Fund.
The Gamaleya vaccine is expected to get conditional registration, meaning it will still need to conduct trials on another 1,600 people, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said in a televised meeting of officials with President Vladimir Putin Wednesday.
Production should begin in September, she said.
More than 165 potential coronavirus COVID vaccine candidates are at different stages of development around the world and 27 experimental vaccines have managed to reach the clinical human trial phases.
Out of these, most talked-about potential Coronavirus COVID19 vaccines are UK’s Oxford-AstraZeneca, US-based Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, Chinese firms Sinovac and Sinopharm, and India’s indigenous COVAXIN.
The initial results of all these vaccine candidates have been positive.
