Coronavirus updates: FDA OKs remdesivir as 1st approved treatment in US

An ABC News analysis of COVID-19 trends across all 50 U.S. states as well as Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Guam found there were increases in hospitalizations over the past two weeks in 41 states plus Guam.

The analysis also found increases in the daily positivity rate of COVID-19 tests in 27 states plus Guam and increases in daily COVID-19 death tolls in 17 states.

Meanwhile, case numbers are higher -- a daily average of at least 15 new cases per 100,000 people over the past week -- and staying high in 31 states plus Puerto Rico and Guam, and case numbers are lower -- a daily average of under 15 new cases per 100,000 people over the past week -- but are going up in nine states.

One state -- North Dakota -- hit a record number of new cases in a 24-hour reporting period. Nine other states -- Arkansas, Iowa, Kentucky, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, Wisconsin and West Virginia -- saw a record number of current hospitalizations in day.

The United States is rapidly approaching an average of 60,000 new cases a day, with no signs of slowing. At its peak in July, the country reported an average of 66,000 new cases per day.

Over the last five and a half weeks, new cases across the nation have surged by more than 72%. More than 1 million cases have already been registered in the month of October alone, with over 412,000 reported in just the last seven days.

States across the Midwest such as Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Wisconsin all continue to consistently report high numbers, while other states such as Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Ohio continue to trend upward.

Additionally, nearly 40,000 Americans are currently hospitalized with COVID-19, the highest in almost two months.

The trends were all analyzed from data collected and published by the COVID Tracking Project over the past two weeks, using the linear regression trend line of the seven-day moving average to examine whether a state's key indicators were increasing, decreasing or remained flat.

ABC News' Benjamin Bell, Brian Hartman, Soorin Kim and Arielle Mitropolous contributed to this report.

Belgian Foreign Minister Sophie Wilmes was hospitalized for COVID-19 and admitted to an intensive care unit on Wednesday evening, a spokesperson told ABC News.

The 45-year-old's condition remains stable, the spokesperson said.

Wilmes, who was the caretaker prime minister of Belgium during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic, announced via Twitter on Saturday that she had tested positive for COVID-19, saying that the "contamination probably happened within my family circle given all precautions taken outside of my home."

She is the country's first woman foreign minister, as well as the first and only woman prime minister in Belgian history.

ABC News' Aicha El Hammar Castano contributed to this report.

The Czech Republic confirmed 14,968 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, setting a new record for the second straight day.

The country's cumulative total now stands at 208,915 confirmed cases, about a third of which have been registered in last seven days. More than 124,000 cases were active, including 4,417 patients who remained hospitalized for COVID-19, while over 83,000 have recovered from the disease, according to data from the Czech health ministry.

So far, 1,739 people have died from the disease in the Czech Republic. The country's highest single-day death toll of 97 was recorded on Monday, according to the health ministry data.

The Czech Republic has the highest rate of COVID-19 infection in Europe. Over the past two weeks, the nation of 10.7 million people has reported 1,066.3 cases per 100,000 population, according to data published Thursday by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.

New restrictive measures, including mandatory mask-wearing outdoors and in cars, went into effect across the Czech Republic on Wednesday. Further restrictions, such as limits on movement and the closure of many businesses, will be imposed Thursday.

COVID-19 patients now take up more than 60% of all intensive care unit beds in hospitals across the greater Paris region of Ile-de-France, a spokesperson for the regional health agency told ABC News.

That figure is up from 59.3% on Tuesday.

There were 669 COVID-19 patients listed in critical condition as of Wednesday night, according to the spokesperson.

France is among several countries in Europe seeing a rise in COVID-19 infections as a second wave of the pandemic hits the region.

So far, France's public health agency has confirmed a total of 957,421 cases, including at least 34,048 deaths. The country has the seventh-highest case count in the world, according to a tally kept by Johns Hopkins University.

ABC News' Ibtissem Guenfoud contributed to this report.