The global coronavirus caseload has topped 218.3 million, while the deaths have surged to more than 4.54 million and vaccinations soared to over 5.32 billion, according to the Johns Hopkins University.

In its latest update on Thursday morning, the University's Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed that the current global caseload, death toll and vaccination tally stood at 218,327,987, 4,541,140 and 5,326,650,944, respectively.

The US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world's highest number of cases and deaths at 39,388,909 and 642,004, respectively, according to the CSSE. In terms of infections, India follows in second place with 32,810,845 cases.

Covid
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The other worst countries with over 3 million cases are Brazil (20,804,215), France (6,868,059), the UK (6,856,932), Russia (6,838,652), Turkey (6,412,247), Argentina (5,190,948), Iran (5,025,233), Colombia (4,911,082), Spain (4,861,883), Italy (4,546,487), Indonesia (4,100,138), Germany (3,970,086) and Mexico (3,352,410), the CSSE figures showed.

In terms of deaths, Brazil comes second with 581,150 fatalities. Nations with a death toll of over 100,000 are India (439,020), Mexico (259,326), Peru (198,295), Russia (180,781), Indonesia (133,676), the UK (133,066), Italy (129,290), France (126,335), Colombia (125,016), Argentina (111,607) and Iran (108,393).

Canadian Covid cases surpass 1.5 million

Meanwhile, Canada reported 1,346 new cases of Covid-19 on Wednesday, bringing the cumulative total to 1,500,520 cases, including 26,947 deaths, according to CTV.

Ontario, Canada's most populous province with 14 million people, reported 656 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday with 13 additional deaths, Xinhua news agency reported.

The province's virus-related death toll came to 9,516 out of 566,206 patients. There were 339 patients in hospital infected with COVID-19. Out of the 339 patients, 163 were in intensive care units.

Of the total patients in ICU, 157 were unvaccinated, 14 were partially vaccinated and 36 were fully vaccinated. Ontario had spotted a total of 10,543 cases of the Delta variant as of Wednesday. As of Wednesday, 9,964,336 people had received both doses of vaccines and were considered to be fully vaccinated.