Virus rages, Trump says it will worsen
Number of Covid-19 infections passes yet another grim milestone, rising by 2 million in just 8 days
WASHINGTON: As the number of Covid-19 infections globally crossed 15 million, US President Donald Trump warned on Tuesday that the “nasty, horrible” coronavirus will get worse in America before it gets better.
The disease has claimed more than 617,000 lives around the world. In the US alone, at least 142,000 people have died from it and over 3.9 million people have been infected.
US is the worst-hit country, followed Brazil, India, Russia and South Africa, in terms of number of cases. A Reuters tally showed that the disease is accelerating the fastest in the Americas, which account for about half of the world’s cases and deaths.
After the first case was reported in Wuhan, China, in January, it took 15 weeks to reach 2 million cases. It then took just eight days to climb above 15 million from the 13 million reached on July 13.
“It (the pandemic) will probably unfortunately get worse before it gets better,” Trump said at the White House. He touted a fall in deaths and progress on vaccines for what he repeatedly referred to as the “China virus”.
Trump expressed his willingness to work with China or other countries to bring a successful vaccine to the US. “We’re willing to work with anybody that is going to get us a good result,” he said, asked if the US would collaborate with China on a vaccine for Americans.
AIRBORNE VIRUS COULD BE INFECTIOUS: STUDY
A new study by scientists at the University of Nebraska, uploaded on medrxiv.org, has shown that the virus taken from micro-droplets, defined as under five microns, can replicate in lab conditions.
This boosts the theory that speaking and breathing, not just coughing and sneezing, can spread Covid-19, and infectious doses of the virus can travel distances far greater than six feet.