’Apocalyptic’ Texas freezes reopening as daily cases hit record high across U.S.

The United States has reported a record daily number of coronavirus cases and Texas paused the reopening of its economy due to a potential “massive outbreak.”

It came as the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention estimated more than 20 million Americans could have contracted the virus, 10 times more than official counts.

In a call with reporters Thursday, CDC Director Robert Redfield said, “Our best estimate right now is that for every case that’s reported, there actually are 10 other infections.”

Redfield said the estimate is based on blood samples collected from across the country that look for the presence of antibodies to the virus.

For every confirmed case of COVID-19, 10 more people had antibodies, Redfield said.

Using that methodology would pushes the tally of U.S. cases to at least 23 million.

Redfield and another top official at the CDC said that young people are driving the surge in cases in the South and West.

He also estimated that 92 to 95 per cent of the U. S. population is still susceptible to the virus.

According to national tallies kept by The New York Times and NBC News, the daily number of coronavirus cases on Wednesday surpassed the previous record set two months ago on April 24.

Increased testing accounted for some of the increase, but experts said the figures showed the virus was surging across southern and western states.

Houston emerged as a new hotspot, with the city’s intensive- care units 97 per cent filled.

Dr. Peter Hotez of the Baylor College of Medicine, said: “The big metro areas ( in Texas) seem to be rising very quickly and some of the models are on the verge of being apocalyptic.”

Texas reported a record daily total of 5,551 new cases on Wednesday.

The state was regarded as a trailblazer, one of the first to start reopening its economy, and was well on the way to returning to normal.

But, announcing a halt to that process, Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas, said: “There is a massive outbreak of COVID-19 across the state of Texas today. This temporary pause will help our state corral the spread until we can safely enter the next phase of opening our state for business.”

The freeze in Texas, the world’s 10th- largest economy, means restaurants will continue to operate at 75 per cent capacity, and bars at 50 per cent. The governor suspended elective hospital procedures in cities, including Houston and Dallas.

Several states set single- day case records this week including Texas, Arizona, California, Mississippi, Nevada and Oklahoma. The case numbers have been rising in 29 states.

On Wednesday there were 36,880 new cases in the U. S., surpassing the previous record of 36,739 in April, according to The New York Times.

States experiencing increased death totals include Arizona and Alabama.

New York, New Jersey and Connecticut on Wednesday ordered travellers from eight mostly Southern states, as well as tri-state residents returning from those areas, to self-quarantine for two weeks on arrival.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Thursday that New York reached a new milestone as the number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 fell to 996, the first time since March 18 the number fell below 1,000.

The overall number of deaths per day in the U.S. has been declining. So far, the U. S. death toll has surpassed 120,000.

A University of Washington model this week projected nearly 180,000 deaths by October 1.