Warning of 4000 deaths a day after US cases double
Coronavirus cases in the United States have doubled in a month to a record 4 million and it is feared that Thanksgiving travel could soon bring the number of people dying each day to 4000.
The number of recorded infections in November surpassed 4 million at the weekend. There were 1.9 million cases in October.
The steep rise, seen in every corner of the country, is expected to accelerate in the coming days as the effect of Americans travelling for Thanksgiving, which was on Thursday, begins to bite.
Despite warnings not to, almost 50 million people were thought to have driven to holiday gatherings, and about 6 million flew.
More than 1 million travellers passed through airport security checks on Wednesday alone, the highest on any single day since the start of the pandemic.
More than 170,000 people are now testing positive on an average day, and on Friday the figure exceeded 200,000 for the first time, with 1400 deaths, although these figures were probably inflated by lags in reporting over Thanksgiving.
Leana Wen, an emergency doctor and professor at George Washington University, said the number would rise much higher.
‘‘We cannot let our guard down,’’ she told CNN. ‘‘The vaccines will make a big difference
‘‘What we expect, unfortunately, as we go through the next couple of weeks into December, is that we might see a surge superimposed upon the surge we’re already in.’’ Anthony Fauci National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
in the spring and the summer; they’re not going to make a difference right now.
‘‘If anything, we are rounding the corner into a calamity. We’re soon going to exceed well more than 2000 deaths, maybe 3000, maybe 4000 every single day here in the US.’’
Yesterday public health experts desperately urged Ameri
cans to mitigate the effect of Thanksgiving gatherings.
‘‘What we expect, unfortunately, as we go through the next couple of weeks into December, is that we might see a surge superimposed upon the surge we’re already in,’’ said Dr Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
‘‘I don’t want to frighten people, except to say it is not too late to do something about this.’’
He urged those returning home to get tested, wear masks, socially distance and avoid large groups of people.
Fauci suggested that greater restrictions would have to be introduced.
‘‘I think we are going to have to make decisions as a nation, state, city and family that we are in a very difficult time, and we’re going to have to do the kinds of restrictions of things we would have liked to have done, particularly in this holiday season, because we’re entering into what’s really a precarious situation,’’ he said.