Japan on Wednesday recorded 415 COVID-19 deaths, the highest-ever count for a single day, health ministry data showed.

The country counted 216,219 newly confirmed coronavirus cases on Wednesday, up 4% from a week earlier, the data also showed, approaching the record high of some 260,000 a day in August.

In the past seven days, Japan had the world's largest confirmed COVID-19 infections and the second-most deaths after the United States, according to a tally by the World Health Organization. (Reporting by Kantaro Komiya Editing by Chang-Ran Kim)