The new coronavirus has killed more than 44,000 people around the world.

It's extremely contagious and spreads from person to person easily through close contact.

The most severe coronavirus cases often include difficulty breathing and may require hospitalization, in which patients may be hooked up to ventilators to blow more oxygen into their lungs.

The novel coronavirus has already killed more than 3,000 people in China, 9,000 in Spain, and 12,000 in Italy, and it isn't done yet.

In the US, the White House's coronavirus task force recently estimated that in a best-case scenario, the virus may kill upward of 200,000 people nationwide.

"We're very worried about every city in the United States, and the potential for this virus to get out of control," US coronavirus-response coordinator Deborah Birx said on Monday morning. "If we do things together well, almost perfectly, we could get in the range of 100,000, 200,000 fatalities."

As of April 1, here's how the death count of COVID-19 compared with other pandemics that have spread far and wide, with devastating consequences:

COVID-19 is extremely contagious and spreads easily from person to person through close contact.

It's too early to calculate the overall death rate from the viral illness, but so far the most severe coronavirus cases often include some difficulty breathing, and many of those require hospitalization. In intensive care, patients may be hooked up to ventilators, which help blow more oxygen into a person's lungs.