TOPLINE
Confirmed cases of coronavirus in the United States top 5 million Saturday, just 16 days after the case count amounted to 4 million on July 23 – with the rapid growth up everything from plans for school to the wider American economy.
A health worker puts a nasal swab sample in a tube in a tent at a Covid-19 test site near St. Louis. … [+]
KEY FACTS
There were at least 5,000,200 confirmed coronavirus cases in the U.S. Saturday, according to the New York Times database, which was slightly higher than Johns Hopkins, a grim milestone driven by a daily average growth in mid-July of 70,000 cases, including a jump of 77,233 cases on July 17, according to the Covid Tracking Project.
The first U.S. case of Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, was reported on Jan. 21, and the country saw significant growth in March and April.
A new rise took hold in the early summer and continued until Friday, when the country added 58,173 new confirmed cases, along with an additional 1,243 deaths.
The growth comes as U.S. residents have a patchwork of state and local responses, no clear federal mandates and an uncertain financial future, as negotiations broke down Friday over another federal incentive program, threatening President Trump to use executive orders to help unemployed people provide, withhold some tax deductions, impose a partial moratorium on evictions and assist with student loan payments.
Globally, there have been more than 19 million since Saturday cconfirmed cases and 723,599 deaths according to Johns Hopkins, with Brazil – placing nearly 3 million cases and more than 100,000 deaths – coming in second only to the United States in both case count and mortality.
The American upheaval has abandoned high school plans, as many, including colleges like Princeton University, have abandoned previous plans to hold personal classes.
key background
Covid-19 has cut a deadly swath across the nation, hitting particularly hard in communities of color. There is no known cure, but Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert, said Friday, during a Q&A with the Brown University School of Public Health, that scientists hope to develop a vaccine against coronavirus that is at least 75% effective; add that 50% if 60% would be effectively acceptable, according to CNBC. Meanwhile, pharmaceutical giant Gilead, the maker of brake drug – apparently the most effective medical treatment for the disease – is facing a challenge by many states seeking access to the drug’s patents, according to Law360. A group of 34 attorneys-general told the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health and FDA that “Gilead should not benefit from the pandemic and it should be driven to do more to help more people,” according to multiple media messages. Gilead said it was “deeply disappointed that a group of State Attorneys General chose to misrepresent facts.”
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