US reports highest weekly COVID-19 vaccinations since July 4

The Biden administration is set to announce Wednesday that it's buying another $1 billion of rapid at-home tests, on top of the $2 billion investment in September. 

White House COVID-19 response coordinator Jeff Zients is expected to make the announcement at the afternoon COVID-19 briefing.

With this new purchase, combined with September's investment and the FDA approval of the ACON rapid test money, the White House says the U.S. is now on track to quadruple the number of rapid at-home tests available to Americans in December. 

A White House official emphasized that this is not just about more tests on the market, but more affordable tests on the market. 

-ABC News' Karen Travers

Daily hospital admissions have dropped by 14.6% in the last week, according to federal data.

Even so, ICU capacities remain at critical levels in several states. In Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Idaho and Texas, about 10% or less space is available.

About 70,000 Americans are currently in hospitals with COVID-19.

Alaska currently has the country's highest infection rate, followed by Montana, North Dakota, Wyoming and Idaho, according to federal data.

Despite high vaccination rates in the Northeast, infection levels in Maine are reaching peak-pandemic records, while case numbers in New Hampshire and Vermont are steadily inching up.

-ABC News' Arielle Mitropoulos

Ellume is recalling nearly 200,000 rapid at-home antigen tests out of concerns over an abnormally high rate of false positives. 

Roughly 427,000 test kits, including thousands sent to retailers and some provided to the Department of Defense, were impacted. About 195,000 of these kits are still unused and subject to the recall, and about 202,000, have already been used. Of those, there were about 42,000 positive results, of which as many as a quarter, or perhaps fewer, of those positives could have been inaccurate, though it's difficult to determine an exact ratio. 

CEO Sean Parsons said in a statement, "I offer my sincere apologies -- and the apologies of our entire company --for any stress or difficulties they may have experienced because of a false positive result," Parsons said. 

Ellume said it identified the root cause as an issue in variation with one of the kit's components. The company said it has "implemented additional controls" and is "continuing to work on resolving the issue that led to this recall." 

Ellume is notifying affected customers and urging confirmatory tests.

-ABC News' Sasha Pezenik

More Americans have died from COVID-19 this year than from the virus in all of 2020, according to newly updated data from Johns Hopkins University.

More than 353,000 COVID-19 deaths have been reported since Jan. 1, compared with 352,000 COVID-19 deaths in the first 10 months of the pandemic.

Over the last month, the U.S. has reported more than 47,000 deaths.

-ABC News' Arielle Mitropoulos