COVID-19 cases surpassed 200,000 worldwide on Wednesday as the new coronavirus continues to spread outside of China, the original epicenter of the outbreak.

The total number of cases now stands at 201,436 as of 7:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday, according to data compiled by John Hopkins. The virus emerged in Wuhan, China in December. It has since spread to most countries around the world, according to the World Health Organization.

The virus has now killed more than 8,000 people around the world, according to JHU, but more than 82,000 people have recovered from the virus.

Almost half of all cases in the world are in China, but the virus, known as COVID-19, has quickly spread across borders. Last week, the WHO declared that Europe had become the new epicenter of the virus.

"More cases are now being reported [in Europe] every day than were reported in China at the height of its epidemic," WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

Italy, where officials have implemented a nationwide lockdown, has reported more than 31,000 cases, according to JHU, and over 2,500 deaths. The virus has infected more than 16,000 people in Iran, JHU's data shows, and over 13,000 in Spain.

On Jan. 20, four countries, China, Thailand, Japan and South Korea, had reported a total of 282 cases, most of which were in China, according to the WHO. The total number of infections across the world hovered around 100,000 on March 6, the WHO's data shows.