US hits record daily COVID-19 deaths as world looks to vaccines in 2021

The U.S. logged its highest ever daily death toll from the coronavirus Wednesday as the world prepares to turn the page on a grim year defined by the pandemic, with much of the globe united in one hope for 2021: that a slew of new vaccines will stamp out COVID-19.

New Year's Eve marks one year since the World Health Organization first mentioned a mysterious pneumonia in China later identified as COVID-19, which went on in 2020 to kill more than 1.79 million people and devastate the global economy in unprecedented ways.

In the world's worst-hit country, the U.S., the numbers keep climbing: On Dec. 30 more than 3,900 people died of COVID-19, a new record, bringing the toll since the pandemic began to more than 19.7 million infections and 341,000 lives lost.

And experts believe the worst is yet to come, as U.S. healthcare workers brace for a surge in cases after major holiday gatherings.

But international efforts helped develop vaccines in record time. On Dec. 30 Britain approved a lower-cost vaccine developed by the University of Oxford and drug firm AstraZeneca, making it the third jab to win approval in the Western world, after the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines.

Britain, hard hit by a worrisome new strain of the virus and now divorced from the European Union due to Brexit, will "move to vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible," tweeted British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

Unlike the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, the one from AstraZeneca and Oxford does not need to be stored at very low temperatures.

It can be kept, transported and handled in normal refrigerated conditions, making it easier and cheaper to administer, which is particularly important for less wealthy nations.

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