Record coronavirus tally in 37 countries over past week
Dozens of countries, including the US, Spain and Australia, have reported record single-day increases in coronavirus infections over the past week, as data shows the pandemic is rising in every region of the world.
In Spain, Catalonia has ordered the closure of nightclubs and late-night bars as fears grow of a second wave, with a new daily record figure likely to deter tourists from visiting one of Europe’s most popular tourist destinations.
The US remains officially the worst hit, according to the data, having this week passed more than 4 million cases in total and recording more than 1,000 deaths from the virus for the fourth straight day.
In Australia, officials enforced a six-week partial lockdown and made masks mandatory for residents in the country’s second-largest city, Melbourne, after a fresh outbreak. Australia and Japan, which also posted a record number of daily cases this week, both warned of a rise in infections among young people, many of whom celebrated the end of social restrictions at bars and parties.
A total of 37 countries – including a number in Europe – reported record daily increases this week, around double the number that did so the previous week, according to a Reuters tally. These also include India and Brazil, which have both exceeded 1 million cases, as well as Bolivia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Bulgaria, Belgium, Uzbekistan and Israel, among others.
Many countries, especially those where officials eased earlier social distancing lockdowns, are experiencing a second peak more than a month after recording their first.
“We will not be going back to the ‘old normal’. The pandemic has already changed the way we live our lives,” the director general of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said this week. “We’re asking everyone to treat the decisions about where they go, what they do and who they meet with as life-and-death decisions – because they are.”
The Reuters data, compiled from official reports, shows a steady rise over the past month in the number of countries reporting record daily increases in the virus that causes Covid-19.
At least seven countries recorded such increases three weeks ago, rising to at least 13 countries two weeks ago, at least 20 countries last week and 37 countries this week.
The true numbers of both cases and deaths are almost certainly under-reported, particularly in countries with poorer healthcare systems, health experts and officials say. For this report, the Reuters data was restricted to countries that provide regular daily numbers. A surge in cases usually precedes a rise in deaths by a couple of weeks.
In Mexico, which also posted a daily record this week and has the fourth-highest death toll of any country, officials warned that a downward trend in case numbers that began in mid-June – about the time that Mexico City began relaxing social distancing measures – could reverse.
Based on the rate of hospital admissions over the past week, the city’s mayor, Claudia Sheinbaum, said hospitalisation levels by October could exceed those registered in June, the height of the pandemic.
“It is important to recognise that if we do not change the trend, there could be exponential growth,” she said.
In Africa, Kenya recorded a record daily number of cases less than two weeks after reopening activity, including domestic passenger flights. The president, Uhuru Kenyatta, who had announced international flights would resume on 1 August, has summoned officials to an emergency meeting tomorrow to discuss the surge in cases.
In the Middle East, Oman imposed new restrictions that begin yesterday in addition to a two-week lockdown that will overlap with the Islamic festival of Eid al-Adha after reporting a record number of cases.