CORONAVIRUS
U.S. reports its highest COVID deaths in a day since mid-May.
As the United States reported its highest number of deaths from the novel coronavirus in a single day since mid-May, President Donald Trump on Wednesday continued to press for the nation’s schools to bring children into classrooms, for businesses to open and for athletes to fill stadiums.
“We’ve got to open up our schools and open up our businesses,” Trump said at an evening news conference at the White House, adding that he wanted to see a college football season this fall.
“Let them play,” he said.
The president also made his latest concerted push to get students back into U.S. schools, saying “99.9 percent” of deaths from the coronavirus pandemic involve adults.
He threatened to divert federal money from schools that don’t open fully, and warned of the intellectual damage that could result if children remain at home indefinitely.
“When you sit at home in a basement looking at a computer, your brain starts to wither away,” Trump said, adding that “all schools should be making plans to resume in person classes as soon as possible.”
On Wednesday, the country reported its highest number of deaths in a single day since mid-May, at nearly 1,500. The country now has seen its seven-day average of newly reported deaths remain above 1,000 for 17 consecutive days.
Texas reported 324 additional deaths Wednesday and Georgia reported 105, marking its second triple-digit day in a row. North Carolina reported an additional 45 deaths Wednesday, tying its highest daily number.
School systems across the country continue to take different approaches as the academic year begins.
Some already have insisted that they will stick to virtual learning for the time being. Others have adopted a hybrid model in which students attend in-person periodically. And some school systems have opened their doors to full-time instruction, with mixed results.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, a Democrat, has said the city’s public schools expect to welcome about 700,000 students who want in-person learning when campuses open in September. That represents most of the 1.1 million students in the school district, the largest in the country.
New York City is poised to be the only one of the country’s 10 largest school districts to open schools for the start of the 2020-21 school year. That became possible when the state — once the U.S. epicenter of the pandemic — dramatically lowered its infection rate through strict public health measures.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, announced last week that school districts could choose to reopen as long as the percentage of people who test positive for the virus in a region is under 5 percent.
The increasing loss of life and the wave of joblessness the pandemic has created haven’t stopped a rebound on Wall Street.
The S&P 500 nearly broke its alltime high Wednesday, almost matching the record from February, before the coronavirus began hammering the United States.
But joblessness remains at historically high levels, with more than 30 million Americans receiving some kind of unemployment assistance. And the U.S. economy shrank by a stunning 9.5 percent from April through June, in what was the fastest quarterly rate drop in modern record-keeping.
Meanwhile, the number of new daily coronavirus cases is rising in several major European countries, including Germany, France and Spain.
Germany on Wednesday announced 1,226 new cases, the highest figure since early May. Speaking to the country’s public broadcaster, German Health Minister Jens Spahn cautioned that the rise in cases was attributable to clusters “in almost all regions of the country.”