Things in California and Texas deaths are growing on versions
Peter Wells in New York
California reported a daily increase of more than 11,000 cases of coronavirus for a second straight day as the state continues to process a backlog of infections caused by a data glitch.
The state’s caseload rose by 11,645, Governor Gavin Newsom revealed at a press conference on Wednesday, down from 12,500 on Tuesday, which was the second-largest jump of one day on record.
Since the pandemic began, California has confirmed 586,056 coronavirus infections.
However, Mr Newsom stated that the latest figures cover 5,433 new Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours and 6,212 infections stemming from a backlog of data.
Texas became the U.S. state with the fourth-highest number of coronavirus deaths after deaths in the state were 9,000 on Wednesday.
A further 324 people died, the Texas Department of Health revealed this afternoon, up from 220 on Tuesday.
This would rank as the state’s largest one-day increase in deaths, except for a one-time revision on July 27, which resulted in the statewide total being revised higher by a combined 675 new and historic deaths.
Since the pandemic began, Texas has now reported 9,034 deaths, the fourth highest number among U.S. states and behind New York, New Jersey and California.
Florida has reported 8,898 deaths, meaning that it and Texas today occupied Massachusetts, which was one of the northeastern states that was hit hardest in the early days of the pandemic.
New York, an early hotspot for Covid-19 in the US, took much less time than California, Texas and Florida to reach its first 100,000 cases, but has increasingly taken more time to add each subsequent batch of 100,000 infections.
New York reported another 700 coronavirus cases on Wednesday, slightly more than the seven-day average.
If that pace kept steady, it would take more than 110 days in New York to top the 500,000-mark mark, after already taking 33 days to go from 400,000 to the total today of 422,703, according to FT analysis of data from Covid Tracking Project.
