U.S. Marks a New Single-Day Record on Covid Deaths

The United States has reached yet another grim milestone in the coronavirus pandemic, with new reporting finding the single-day death toll has reached another record high.

According to the Covid Tracking Project, the death toll in the past day surpassed 4400 — a record high for the pandemic in the past year.

Our daily update is published. States reported 1.8M tests, 186k cases, 122,700 people currently hospitalized with COVID-19, and a record 4,409 deaths. pic.twitter.com/5WYUdLQoFw

— The COVID Tracking Project (@COVID19Tracking) January 21, 2021

186,000 new cases have been reported in the past day, and hospitalizations continue to top 100,000.

The record high death toll comes on the final day of Donald Trump’s presidency and the beginning of Joe Biden’s. President Biden, who spoke at a nationwide memorial for Covid-19 victims on Tuesday, heavily criticized the Trump administration’s approach and the current vaccine rollout, and new CDC director Rochelle Walensky said in a statement today that “testing, surveillance, and vaccination must accelerate rapidly.”

JUST IN: New CDC Dir. Walensky says agency "will begin leading a comprehensive review of all existing guidance related to COVID-19" and that "wherever needed, this guidance will be updated so that people can make decisions and take action based upon the best available evidence." pic.twitter.com/naQJXAM7On

— NBC News (@NBCNews) January 20, 2021