A running tally from the John Hopkins University in the United States shows that the death toll from the coronavirus pandemic has reached 5,116.
United States sets a one-day record of 884 people killed in 24 hours.
Although, the US deaths toll is lower than those of Italy and Spain but above the 3,316 recorded for China, where the pandemic first emerged in December.
According to Johns Hopkins, the US leads the world in number of cases of new coronavirus, with 215,417.
President Donald Trump, who earlier had downplayed the pandemic’s impact on the US, said Wednesday that “we’re going to have a couple of weeks, starting pretty much now, but especially a few days from now, that are going to be horrific.”
Recently a senior US scientist Anthony Fauci issued a cautious prediction that the novel coronavirus could claim 100,000 to 200,000 lives in the country.