WASHINGTON — The United States recorded 1 million coronavirus cases on Tuesday, accounting for nearly a third of the total cases worldwide and becoming the first nation in the world to reach the grim milestone.

The landmark number of COVID-19 cases in the US comes just one day after global cases surpassed 3 million.

More Americans have now died from coronavirus in less than two months than in the entire nine years of the Vietnam War — more than 58,000, according to some US media reports.

The figures, from tracking at Johns Hopkins University, show a worldwide death toll of more than 210,000, though the real numbers are likely to be higher owing to limited testing and differences in counting deaths.

Infections in the US far exceed all other nations, with Spain recording 229,422 cases and Italy on the cusp of surpassing 200,000.

China has officially confirmed 83,938 and 4,637 deaths from the virus, though its actual numbers are widely suspected of being much higher.

Despite the rising death toll in the US, some states have eased restrictions in the face of an economy battered by the pandemic.

Similarly, countries in Europe are beginning to loosen their lockdown restrictions, and France, Spain and Greece are among the latest to put forward roadmaps for restarting their economies.

But uncertainty about what people should do to protect their health after they emerge from lockdown remains.

Public health experts have, however, warned that a premature rollback of social-distancing policies could cause a surge in new infections. — Agencies