US COVID Cases Spike To 1M Daily Amid Omicron Surge

The U.S. hit a grim milestone on Monday, reaching over 1 million new COVID-19 cases in a single day.

A total of 1,082,549 new cases of the virus were reported Monday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University - a record for the nation.

About 1 in every 100 Americans will have had a positive case of COVID-19 in just the last week, data from Johns Hopkins suggested, as reported by USA Today.

The case count spiked as the highly infectious Omicron variant spreads its way throughout the country, drastically increasing the number of new infections reported throughout the U.S.

Omicron accounts for about 58.6% of all U.S. infections, while the Delta variant makes up about 41% of new COVID cases, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicated.

The total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the U.S. since the pandemic started nearly two years ago is 56,189,733, according to Johns Hopkins. A total of 827,749 COVID-19-related deaths have been reported in the U.S. over this time.

COVID case counts may be higher due to the delay in reporting from the holiday weekend, as a number of states did not report data on Dec. 31 or over the weekend, CNBC reported.

According to USA Today, one-fifth of states reported infections Saturday and one-third reported cases on Sunday.

About 98,000 Americans are hospitalized due to COVID-19 infections, up 32% from a week prior, according to seven-day average data from Jan. 3, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, as reported by CNBC.

During the Delta surge, hospitalizations peaked at 103,000 patients in the U.S. in early September, CNBC said.