US Death Toll now Higher Than Any Other Country in the World

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Sina Retzlaff
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Updated 12 April 2020 4pm.

The United State’s death toll of 20,577 has surpassed Italy’s 19,468 and now higher than any other country since the deadly pandemic broke out in Wuhan, China late last year.

The number of recorded cases in the US has reached an astronomicsl 532,879 and continues to rise despite its national lockdown. That number is now more than triple that of the next nearest country, Spain.

In the past 24 hours the US has moved to top the number of cases as well as deaths for COVID-19

They have also surpassed any other recorded fatalities in a single day, with over 2,000 deaths recorded Saturday (Friday in the US). Close to 800 of those deaths were in New York. The city with a population of over 8 million has become an epicentre of coronavirus in itself with 181,144 cases and 8,627 deaths.

 

As at time of update 4pm 12 April 2020

The US is home to close to 300,000 Americans of Samoan decent living across all 50 states, making up the second largest Pacific Island group in America after native Hawaiians.

Despite the pandemic killing close to 20,000 Americans, President Trump is grappling with the decision to end the national lockdown. Bankers, corporate executives and industrialists are pleading with him to reopen the country as soon as possible, while medical experts beg for more time to curb the coronavirus.

On his daily news briefing yesterday President Trump said he is contemplating when and how he will relax physical distancing guidelines and reopen the American economy with over 16 million people reportedly out of work.

“I’m going to have to make a decision, and I only hope to God that it’s the right decision,”

He added, “I would say without question it’s the biggest decision I’ve ever had to make”.

Yet the decision on when and how to reopen is not entirely his. The stay-at-home orders keeping most Americans indoors were issued by Governors of states.

“So every day we need to continue to do what we did yesterday, and the week before, and the week before that, because that’s what in the end is going to take us up across the peak and down the other side,” she said.
US health care resources struggle to cope with surge of cases and deaths.

The Director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington – Dr Chris Murray who created a model the White House is using to gauge the peak of coronavirus cases, says the US is near its peak.

“We re-run the model, basically, almost every night — and the new returns suggest different peaks in different states, but at the national level we seem to be pretty much close to the peak,” he said.
IHME Director Dr Christopher Murray
The model projects about 61,500 Americans will lose their lives to the virus by August — but that number is based on the country keeping its social distance measures until the end of May. If they factor in states that may lift these rules by May 1, the numbers “don’t look good,’ says Dr. Murray.
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