By Jessie Yeung, Adam Renton and Zamira Rahim, CNN
The United States recorded 23,285 new cases of coronavirus and 1,518 related deaths on Wednesday, according to Johns Hopkins University.
That raises the national total to at least 1,551,853 cases and 93,439 deaths.
The totals includes cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases.
New York state remains the hardest hit, followed by New Jersey, Illinois, and Massachusetts.
Check out CNN's live tracker of US cases here:
From CNN's Helen Regan
Before the coronavirus pandemic hit, India and China were positioning themselves as global climate leaders.
While virus lockdowns have provided temporary blue skies from New Delhi to Beijing, and beyond, as China and India prepare to resuscitate their economies experts warn doing so without environmental regard could wind back their previous good work on climate.
That could have devastating effects on the health on billions of people. Air pollution already kills 7 million of us every year, damages our children's health and development, causes serious breathing and lung problems, and even affects babies in the womb.
Now climate experts are demanding countries use this recovery period to enact policies that reduce emissions and invest in renewable energy and climate-resilient infrastructure. That, they say, will create jobs, be better for the economy in the long term and, crucially, save lives.
"The recovery packages can either kill these two birds with one stone -- setting the global economy on a pathway towards net-zero emissions -- or lock us into a fossil system from which it will be nearly impossible to escape," they wrote earlier this month in the Oxford Review of Economic Policy.
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From CNN's Kevin Liptak
US President Donald Trump took to Twitter again tonight to criticize China's response to the coronavirus outbreak, saying, "It all comes from the top."
This is as far as he’s gone in calling out Chinese President Xi Jinping, although Trump still isn’t naming the Chinese leader directly.
"They could have easily stopped the plague, but they didn't," the tweet said.
Trump then goes on to more familiar claims that China wants presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden to win the 2020 US election because he wouldn’t be as tough as him on Beijing.
From CNN's Oliver Darcy
The US' top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, has been conspicuously absent from national television interviews over the past two weeks, as the White House moves ahead with reopening the economy.
Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, last gave a television interview when he spoke to CNN on May 4.
Prior to his recent absence from the airwaves, Fauci was regularly appearing on national news programs to update the American people on the country's fight against the coronavirus.
While Fauci has been on "modified quarantine" after possible exposure to the virus, he has still been present at the White House and testified remotely before the Senate last week.
Fauci's absence was particularly noteworthy this week, given the positive early results regarding a vaccine developed by the biotech company Moderna in partnership with the National Institutes of Health, which Fauci's NIAID falls under.
Despite the NIH's role in helping to develop the vaccine, Fauci did not appear for interviews to discuss the promising results.
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From CNN's Alexandra Lin in Hong Kong
China recorded two new coronavirus cases and no new deaths yesterday, according to the country's National Health Commission.
Of the new cases, one was an imported infection in Guangdong province and the other a local case in Shanghai.
This raises the national total to 82,967 confirmed symptomatic cases, of which 84 remain active.
Some 31 new asymptomatic cases were also reported -- a total of 375 asymptomatic patients remain under medical observation. These cases are counted separately from confirmed symptomatic cases.
The national death toll stands at 4,634.
From CNN's Stefano Pozzebon and Mitchell McCluskey
Bolivian health minister Marcelo Navajas was arrested in a mounting corruption scandal over the purchase of 170 ventilators at an inflated cost, Col. Ivan Rojas, chief of the Bolivian Special Forces in the Fight Against Crime, announced on Wednesday.
Bolivian interim President Jeanine Añez said on Twitter that Bolivia used $2 million in funds from the Inter-American Development Bank to purchase 170 ventilators from a Spanish company.
Navajas and several others were arrested and taken in for questioning, but public prosecutors have yet to present charges, Rojas said. Navajas was also removed from his post as health minister after being arrested.
On Monday, Añez pledged to fully investigate the purchase.
"We will keep investigating, no matter who's going to fall," Añez tweeted hours after Navajas' arrest.
A spokesperson for the Inter-American Development Bank said it began investigating possible irregularities around the purchase as soon as the bank was aware.
"The Inter-American Development Bank views with great concern information about possible irregularities in the acquisition of ventilators by Bolivia’s Ministry of Health with financing provided by the Bank, and we respect the efforts that the country’s public institutions are making to shed light on the facts of the case," the spokesperson said in a statement to CNN.
From CNN's Maggie Fox
Coronavirus testing in the United States is disorganized and needs coordination at the national level, infectious disease experts said in a new report released on Wednesday.
Right now, testing is not accurate enough to use alone to make most decisions, including who should go back to work or to school, the team at the University of Minnesota said.
"It's a mess out there," Mike Osterholm, head of the university's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, which issued the report, told CNN.
"Testing is very, very important, but we're not doing the right testing."
The number of tests that have been completed -- numbers widely reported by states and by the White House -- show only part of the picture, the report reads.
"The data is really kind of screwed up," Osterholm said. "It's because the public health system is overwhelmed."
The report calls on the US Department of Health and Human Services to appoint a panel to oversee and organize testing.
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From CNN's Barbara Starr
The USS Theodore Roosevelt has returned to sea, after being docked in Guam for weeks due to a coronavirus outbreak onboard in March.
The US Navy announced the aircraft carrier left Guam today and entered the Philippine Sea to conduct carrier qualifications.
Onboard outbreak: More than 1,000 of the ship’s nearly 4,900-member crew tested positive for Covid-19. After evacuating some 4,000 sailors from the ship to Guam, the US Navy had been returning sailors following a period of quarantine and isolation in the hopes of getting the aircraft carrier to sea as soon as possible.
“After cleaning the entire ship from bow to stern, the appropriate number of crewmembers to operate the ship underway have returned from quarantine after passing rigorous return-to-work criteria,” the Navy said in a news release.
The release added that they were bringing fewer sailors onboard, which would help increase social distancing.
New measures: All sailors onboard have taken required lessons on virus prevention and mitigation, and practiced simulation emergency procedures while executing measures like wearing masks, said the release.
Other virus prevention measures include adjusted meal hours, sanitizing spaces, minimizing in-person meetings, and a simulated medevac.
"It was an unprecedented challenge to get to this point and I'm proud of the Rough Rider Team's tenacity and resiliency in the face of uncertainty," said Capt. Carlos Sardiello, the ship's commanding officer.
