NEW YORK, Jan. 6 (Xinhua) -- U.S. COVID-19 deaths surpassed 360,000 on Wednesday, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.

With the national caseload topping 21.2 million, the death toll across the United States rose to 360,443 as of 6:21 p.m. local time (2321 GMT), according to the CSSE data.

New York State reported 38,912 fatalities, topping the U.S. state-level death toll list. Texas is ranked second, with 29,115 deaths, followed by California with 27,620 deaths and Florida with 22,317 deaths, the CSSE tally showed.

States with more than 11,000 fatalities also include New Jersey, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Massachusetts and Georgia.

The United States remains the hardest-hit nation, with the world's highest caseload and death toll, accounting for more than 24 percent of global cases and over 19 percent of global deaths.

The United States reported over 350,000 coronavirus deaths on Jan. 2, and added 10,000 deaths in four days.

U.S. daily COVID-19 fatalities hit 3,775 on Tuesday, the highest rise in coronavirus deaths in a single day since the pandemic began, the CSSE chart showed.

An updated model forecast by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington projected a total of 567,195 COVID-19 deaths in the United States by April 1, 2021, based on the current projection scenario.