New Delhi, September 5: With nearly 4.1 million COVID-19 cases, India on Saturday crossed Brazil to become the nation with second highest caseload, showed data collated by the Worldometers tracker. While the numbers are yet to be confirmed by the Indian government, it is expected that the nation's tally would officially be ahead of Brazil on Sunday, when the Union Health Ministry would release the updated stats. COVID-19 Vaccine Update: WHO Says Widespread Vaccination Not Possible Until Mid-2021.

By the time this report was published, Worldometers tracker showed India clocking 4,092,550 cases, with 72,311 new infections being reported so far today. Brazil, on the other hand, has reported a cumulative total of 4,091,801.

Even as Brazil has slipped behind India, experts have pointed out that the latter's per million transmission and fatality rate is way lower than the former.

Despite housing a population of 1.3 billion, the South Asian nation has reported 70,519 deaths so far (according to Worldometers), as compared to 125,584 fatalities recorded by its Latin American counterpart. The population of Brazil is 20.95 crore, less than one-sixth of India.

The country worst-affected by COVID-19 - both in terms of caseload and deaths - remains the United States of America. As per the latest update, a total of 6,399,044 coronavirus cases have been recorded in the US so far. The death count had reached 192,293.

Countries across the world are hopeful of achieving herd immunity with the release of vaccines by early next year. While Russia has unveiled the world's first silver bullet against the contagious disease, experts have raised doubts over its efficacy.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Sep 05, 2020 09:37 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).