The death toll from the coronavirus in the U.S. hit 150,000 on Wednesday, by the far the highest in the world, according to the tally kept by Johns Hopkins University.
The bleak milestone comes amid signs that the nation's outbreak is beginning to stabilize in the Sun Belt but heating up in the Midwest, fueled largely by young adults who are hitting bars, restaurants and gyms again.
The surge has been accompanied by a burgeoning outbreak of misinformation and conspiracy theories about supposed cures and the effectiveness of masks.
Brazil was second with over 88,000 deaths, followed by Britain at about 46,000.
Johns Hopkins put the nation's confirmed infections at nearly 4.4 million, also the highest in the world, though the real numbers in the U.S. and around the globe are believed to be higher because of limits on testing and the many mild cases that have gone undetected or unreported.
The US has seen rising levels of cases and deaths with hotspots emerging in the south and midwest in recent weeks.
A report from President Donald Trump's task force put 21 states into what it calls "red zones." The District of Columbia and 28 other states are classified as "yellow," according to a copy of the report obtained by the New York Times.
Only Vermont is categorized as "green."
But Trump has continued to insist governors reopen their states, saying Monday, one day after the report was disseminated to state leaders, that "a lot of" governors should be carrying out further reopening.
