COVID-19: US deaths hit 75,000 as second wave feared

NEW YORK: The United States recorded an alarming spike of at least 2,448 fresh deaths due to coronavirus in the 24 hours, taking the total death toll in the country to 75,543.

According to Johns Hopkins University, the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the US has now risen to 1,254,750. Researchers claim that New York has been the primary source of infections around the country and that the state acted like the “Grand Central Station” taking the virus across many directions.

Till yesterday, New York state reported 323,978 confirmed cases of coronavirus and over 20,000 virus-related deaths alone. The state is still seeing an average of over 200 deaths daily from coronavirus.

As the pandemic continues to wreak havoc in the country, nearly 3.2 million Americans reportedly filed to unemployment benefits last week, taking the total of job losses caused by the COVID-19 in the US to 33.5 million.

Reflecting on the “damage” that the coronavirus outbreak has done to the country, US President Donald Trump yesterday said that the pandemic has been the “worst attack” in US history, worse than the 1942 Pearl Harbor attack and the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The Trump administration has been blaming China for “unleashing” the pandemic on the world. Both Donald Trump and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claim to have “enormous evidence” that the coronavirus outbreak originated from a laboratory in China’s Wuhan.

Meanwhile, more than 3.8 million cases of the novel coronavirus, including at least 269,000 deaths, have been reported across the world, as per the Johns Hopkins University.

The US is the worst-hit country in the world after Italy, Spain, Britain and France. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has recently issued a warning that COVID-19 could kill as many as 190,00 in Africa during the first year of the pandemic if containment measures fail.