COVID-19: US infection rate rising outside New York as states open up
NEW YORK: Take the New York metropolitan area's progress against the Coronavirus out of the equation and the numbers show the rest of the US is moving in the wrong direction, with the known infection rate rising even as states move to lift their lockdowns, an Associated Press analysis found Tuesday.
New confirmed infections per day in the U.S. exceed 20,000, and deaths per day are well over 1,000, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University.
And public health officials warn that the failure to flatten the curve and drive down the infection rate in places could
lead to many more deaths perhaps tens of thousands as people are allowed to venture out and businesses reopen.
Make no mistakes: This virus is still circulating in our community, perhaps even more now than in previous weeks said Linda Ochs, director of the Health Department in Shawnee County, Kansas.
Meanwhile, asserting that the United States has flattened the curve on Coronavirus, President Donald Trump said on Tuesday the country is now in the next stage of the battle, which is a “very safe phased and gradual reopening”.
“Thanks to the profound commitment of our citizens, we have flattened the curve and countless American lives have been saved. Our country is now in the next stage of the battle. A very safe, phased and gradual reopening of our country,” Trump said in his remarks at Honeywell International in Phoenix.
The densely packed New York metropolitan area, consisting of about 20 million people across a region that encompasses the city's northern suburbs, Long Island and northern New Jersey, has been the hardest-hit corner of the country, accounting for at least one-third of the nation's 70,000 deaths. When the still lockeddown area is included, new infections in the US appear to be declining, according to the AP analysis.