The United States reported more than 71,600 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, approaching a record number of daily infections set in late July as the outbreak takes root across the Midwest and hospitalizations rise.

Coronavirus cases grew by 5% or more over the past week in 38 states as of Thursday, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University that uses a weekly average to smooth out fluctuations in daily reporting.

Some people point to an increase in coronavirus testing to explain the rise in cases.

conducted more than 1.1 million tests on Thursday and a record 1.2 million tests on Monday, according to data compiled by the Covid Tracking Project, an independent volunteer organization launched by journalists at The Atlantic.  .

Covid-19 hospitalizations have been on the rise, a worrying trend that public health experts warn can be a better indicator of an outbreak's severity because it doesn't count asymptomatic cases.

More than 40,000 people are currently in the hospital with the coronavirus in the U.S., according to the Covid Tracking Project.

Many of them are in the West and Midwest, including Iowa, Montana, North Dakota, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Wisconsin and Wyoming, according to a CNBC analysis of Covid Tracking Project data.

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