On Friday (13), public health officials reported more than 181,000 new cases across the country, more than ever before.
For weeks, as coronavirus cases spiked across the United States, deaths rose far more slowly, staying significantly lower than in the early, deadliest weeks of the nation’s outbreak in the spring. New treatments, many hoped, might slow a new wave of funerals.
But now, signs are shifting: More than 1,000 Americans are dying of the coronavirus every day on average, a 50 percent increase in the last month. Iowa, Minnesota, New Mexico, Tennessee and Wisconsin have recorded more deaths over the last seven days than in any other week of the pandemic. Twice this past week, there have been more than 1,400 deaths reported in a single day.
More than 244,000 people have died from the coronavirus in the United States, more than any other country, and experts say the pace of new deaths is likely to accelerate in the coming weeks.
Deaths lag several weeks behind infections, so the toll being recorded now reflects transmission that happened several weeks ago, before the country began logging more than 140,000 new cases per day and hospitalizations reached their highest levels of the pandemic.
The country remains far below the death toll of the spring, when as many as 2,200 people were perishing each day, but some estimates suggest that the United States may soon be on track to reach or even exceed those levels.
