GENEVA, Aug. 8 (Xinhua) -- The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the Americas has crossed the 10 million mark, accounting for over half of the global tally, according to data released by the World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday.

As of 10 a.m. CET (0800 GMT) on Friday, 154,118 new COVID-19 cases had been reported in the Americas during the past 24 hours, taking the total tally to 10,135,322, which took up more than 50 percent of the global tally -- 18,902,735. Meanwhile, 4,598 deaths from the COVID-19 infection had been recorded in the region, bringing the total fatalities to 376,606, the data showed.

With the daily increase of new confirmed COVID-19 cases in the Americas exceeding 100,000 ever since July 9, the region has been regarded by the WHO as a new epicenter of the pandemic.

The United States has the largest number of both confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths in the world, followed by Brazil. As of Friday, the United States has reported more than 4,781,612 cumulative confirmed cases, and Brazil 2,859,073.

Besides, the number of cumulative confirmed COVID-19 cases in Mexico, Peru and Chile have all surpassed 350,000.