The number of fatalities in the United States due to the novel coronavirus crossed 300,000 on Monday, according to Reuters tally.
The new figures were recorded as the hardest hit nation begins a historic inoculation campaign using a vaccine developed by Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE.
Moderna Inc’s vaccine could get approval as soon as this week.
The vaccine comes as COVID-19 cases explode across the nation and hospital intensive care units run out of beds.
According to Reuters, daily coronavirus cases and deaths have set records multiple times since Thanksgiving holidays with daily fatalities topping 3,000 for the second time last week on Friday, the same day the vaccine got approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
The figures revealed that it took only 27 days to go from 250,000 total U.S. COVID-19 deaths to 300,000 - the fastest 50,000-death jump since the pandemic began. Some models project that deaths could reach 500,000 before vaccines become widely available in the spring and summer.
The United States recently crossed 16 million confirmed cases - the most in the world.
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