The latest on the coronavirus pandemic and vaccines

The United States reported 3,744 additional coronavirus deaths on Wednesday -- a single-day record high for the second consecutive day, according to Johns Hopkins University's tally.

The previous record of 3,725 fatalities was recorded on Tuesday.

JHU also recorded 229,042 new Covid-19 cases nationwide on Wednesday.

At least 19,740,468 total cases and 342,312 deaths have now been recorded in the US, according to JHU.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases.  

At least 12,409,050 vaccine doses have been distributed and at least 2,794,588 doses administered, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

CNN is tracking US cases:

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Tracking Covid-19 cases in the US

Japan's government may consider declaring a state of emergency if Covid-19 continues to spread further, a minister in charge of the country's coronavirus response said on Twitter Wednesday.

Tokyo recorded 944 new Covid-19 cases for Wednesday -- the highest daily increase in infections since the pandemic began. The total number of people to have been infected in Tokyo now stands at 58,840, according to the Japanese Health Ministry.

Overall, Japan reported 3,851 new coronavirus cases and 65 virus-related deaths on Wednesday, the Health Ministry said. It added that 668 patients were in serious condition on Wednesday, down by seven from the previous day. 

The total number of confirmed cases nationwide now stands at 231,016, while the death toll has reached 3,427.

The Brazilian Health Regulatory Agency (Anvisa) has modified its guide for emergency vaccine use after the pharmaceutical company Pfizer said it could not provide some of the information required by the Brazilian government to gain authorization.

Top officials from Anvisa met with representatives from Pfizer to discuss the emergency use rules on Wednesday, according to a news release from the health agency.

Among information Pfizer could not provide was a timeline for the number of doses that would be provided to Brazil, according to the release.

Some context: Earlier this week, Pfizer had announced that it would not seek emergency authorization in Brazil due to some of the rules put in place by Anvisa.

Brazil has recorded more than 7.5 million Covid-19 cases and its death toll is nearing 200,000, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Australia’s state of Victoria reported three locally transmitted Covid-19 cases on Thursday, breaking a 61-day streak of no community infections.

As of Thursday morning, Victoria has a total of 10 active cases, the state's Department of Health spokesperson Graeme Walker told CNN.

Among them, six cases are in quarantine from inbound travel, and another is a teenage girl isolating at home after contracting the virus in the state of New South Wales.

As a result of the fresh outbreak in the state, new Covid-19 restrictions have been issued hours before New Year’s Eve celebrations. Gatherings of more than 15 people are no longer allowed and masks are now mandatory indoors. 

China has drastically scaled up its emergency use program in recent weeks, officials revealed Thursday as they announced the approval of the country's first homegrown coronavirus vaccine, developed by Sinopharm.

Since December 15, the country has administered more than 3 million doses of coronavirus vaccines on "key groups" in the population, Zeng Yixin, vice-minister of China's National Health Commission, said at a news conference Thursday. He did not identify who those groups were.

That's on top of the more than 1.5 million doses of coronavirus vaccines administered to "high-risk groups" as of the end of November, Zeng added.

Among those who have been inoculated, fewer than 0.1% developed a light fever, and about two people per million developed "relative serious adverse reactions" such as allergies, according to Zeng.

China rolled out its controversial emergency use program in July, inoculating hundreds of thousands of people with experimental vaccines that did not have their safety and efficacy proven in clinical trials. People who received the vaccines include healthcare workers, border control personnel and state-owned company employees who needed to travel overseas.

Chinese regulators have approved a coronavirus vaccine developed by state-owned pharmaceutical giant Sinopharm, officials announced Thursday.

Sinopharm said yesterday its coronavirus vaccine is 79.34% effective, citing interim analysis of Phase 3 clinical trials.

Though few details were provided, the company said the vaccine met the standards of the World Health Organization and China's own regulator, the National Medical Products Administration.

Read more about the Sinopharm vaccine:

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China's Sinopharm says its coronavirus vaccine is 79% effective

The United States reported 125,220 current Covid-19 hospitalizations on Wednesday, setting a new record high since the pandemic began, according to the Covid Tracking Project (CTP).

This is the 29th consecutive day that the US has remained above 100,000 current hospitalizations. 

According to CTP data, the highest hospitalization numbers are:

The new Covid-19 variant, first identified in the United Kingdom, has been detected in a Covid-19 patient in San Diego, California, county supervisor Nathan Fletcher announced Wednesday during a news conference. 

Fletcher said the patient is a 30-year-old man with no travel history that started developing Covid-related symptoms on Dec. 27. 

An ensemble forecast published Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now projects there will be 383,000 to 424,000 coronavirus deaths in the United States by Jan. 23.

Unlike some individual models, the CDC’s ensemble forecast only offers projections a few weeks into the future. The previous ensemble forecast, published Dec. 23, projected up to 419,000 coronavirus deaths by Jan. 16.

At least 341,845 people have already died from Covid-19 in the United States, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.