In the first 11 days of January, the U.S. reported more than 30,000 lives lost to COVID-19 -- that's more deaths in 11 days than the entire month of August.

The virus is now claiming more lives every day than number of Americans killed on Sept. 11, according to ABC News’ analysis of data compiled by the COVID Tracking Project.

Nearly 130,000 people are hospitalized with COVID-19 across the country.

Data released Monday showed six states hitting a record number of current hospitalizations: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Maryland and Virginia.

California has the most people hospitalized of any state with more than 22,000 patients. California is followed by Texas, New York, Florida and Georgia.

ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos contributed to this report.

Citi Field, home to the New York Mets, will become a 24/7 mega-vaccination site to open the week of Jan. 25.

The Queens baseball stadium will vaccinate 5,000 to 7,000 people daily.

“We even welcome Yankees fans," New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio joked.

Citi Field is the latest sports facility to convert to a mass vaccination site, joining Los Angeles’ Dodger Stadium and Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium.

Disneyland is set to become the first mass vaccination site in Orange County, California, later this week.

ABC News’ Aaron Katersky and Mark Crudele contributed to this report.

The closure of the Canada-U.S. border has been extended to Feb. 21.

The border has been closed to all nonessential traffic since March. The closure agreement is reviewed by U.S. and Canadian government authorities each month.

ABC News’ Christine Theodorou contributed to this report.

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said the federal government will no longer hold back COVID-19 vaccine doses and is now recommending states inoculate anyone 65 and older as well as those under the age of 65 who have two or more conditions or illnesses.

"This is just a staging and moving to the next phase on the vaccine program. We've had so much success with quality and predictable manufacturing and almost flawless distribution of the vaccine, but we have seen now that the administration in the states has been too narrowly focused," Azar told ABC News chief anchor George Stephanopoulos in an interview Tuesday on Good Morning America.

"So, what are we doing? Three things. First, We have already made available every dose of vaccine," he said. "So we had been holding back second doses as a safety stock. We now believe that our manufacturing is predictable enough that we can ensure second doses are available for people from ongoing production. So everything is now available to our states and our health care providers."

"Second, we are calling on our governors to now vaccinate people age 65 and over and under age 65 with a comorbidity, because we have got to expand the group," he continued. "We've already distributed more vaccine than we have health care workers and people in nursing homes."

"Third, we've got to get more channels of administration," he added. "We've got to get it to pharmacies, get it to community health centers, and we are here and we will deploy teams to support states doing mass vaccination efforts if they wish to do so. It has been overly hospitalized so far in too many states."

As of 9 a.m. ET on Monday, more than 25 million COVID-19 vaccine doses have been distributed nationwide but fewer than 9 million people have received their first dose, according to data provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Seychelles, an island nation of just under 100,000 people, has begun immunizing its population against COVID-19 with a vaccine developed by China’s state-owned pharmaceutical company, Sinopharm.

Seychelles President Wavel Ramkalawan became the first African head of state to receive the Sinopharm vaccine on Sunday, as the country officially launched a national COVID-19 immunization campaign -- the first in Africa to do so. The Seychelles Ministry of Health began administering the shot to priority groups on Monday, starting with health care professionals and other front-line workers, according to a press release from the president’s office.

Last month, China authorized Sinopharm's vaccine for general use after the company announced that preliminary data from late-stage trials had shown it to be 79.3% effective. The shot is administered in two doses.

The United Arab Emirates donated 50,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine to Seychelles. India offered 100,000 doses of another COVID-19 vaccine developed by England’s University of Oxford and British-Swedish pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, which are due to arrive in Seychelles at the end of the month, according to the president's office.

“With such a robust vaccination campaign, Seychelles aims to be the first country in the world to vaccinate at least 70% of its over 18 population,” Ramkalawan said in a statement Sunday. “From there, we will be able to declare Seychelles as being COVID safe. This will allow us to reopen our economy.”

Seychelles, an Indian Ocean archipelago located off the coast of East Africa, has reported 508 confirmed cases of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic, including at least one death, according to the latest data from the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.