“We’ll easily hit the figure figure in terms of the number of cases,” Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, told CNN on Friday night. “And the deaths are going to be fairly high in the next three to four weeks, usually with new cases increasing by about two to three weeks.”
According to Johns Hopkins University, the seven-day average of the country’s new daily cases has surpassed 63,000 on Friday since the average tic increased by 84% in mid-September.
Health officials say the reopening of schools and colleges in the U.S. has a favorable trend and is largely driven by small gatherings – often family events – that are growing indoors, where the virus is likely to spread.
And that’s ahead of many popular holidays, when health officials worry that more Americans may disappoint their guards and choose to visit family and friends and increase driving forward.
He said on Friday, “It would be really nice to share with all of you at Thanksgiving that our numbers are coming down as we go into the holiday season.” “We have increased the capacity of the hospital. Our schools have remained open, our businesses have been open during that holiday season.”
Cases in 34 states are on the rise
At least 34 states reported more new Covid-19 cases last week than the previous week, according to data from Johns Hopkins. In Georgia, health officials recorded their highest one-day case count since early September on Friday. Health officials in Ohio reported new cases every day for the third day in a row, and officials in Oklahoma reported more than a thousand new infections for the fourth day in a row.
Illinois Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Isik made an emotional appeal to residents on the importance of face painting.
“We’ve seen an increase in the number of hospitals, people bringing in more beds, trying to re-prepare covid units. And these staff who tried to save as many people as they went through so much pain as they see the repetition of history. . “, He said. “We don’t have a vaccine yet, but we do have a mask, and we’re telling people to use it, and I don’t know what else to say.”
And Colorado officials issued a new order that would limit the number of people from more than two households to 10 in response to a climbing infection and hospitalization.
“We need to keep gatherings small and keep people from fewer households – we’re telling everyone to ‘shrink the bubble,'” Jill Hanseker Rhea, executive director of the Colorado Department of Health Environment and the Environment, said in a statement released Friday.
‘This is not an exercise’
Despite the trends of difficulties, health officials can maintain basic public health measures: masks, social distance, avoid crowds and frequent hand washing.
“They seem very simple, but we’re not doing it uniformly and that’s one of the reasons why we’re seeing this boom,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said Friday. “We can control them without shutting down the country.”
“I think it would be a great idea for everyone to do it equally,” he said. “If people don’t wear masks, then we should make it mandatory.”
A leading World Health Organization official on Friday also called on the country’s leaders to take “immediate action” to prevent “further unnecessary deaths, disruption of essential health services and reopening of schools.”
“I said it in February and I repeat it today, this is not an exercise,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanam Ghebrieus told a news conference.
Expert: No vaccine this year
While many experts and officials have worked to give an optimistic estimate of when the Covid-19 will be available, the timeline remains uncertain.
Dr. Franc, Director of National Institutes of Health. Francis Collins said Friday that when he visited the U.S. While “cautiously optimistic” about being vaccinated by the end of the year, he said “it doesn’t happen and it will take longer.”
But Collins added that it’s good news that the U.S. Has more than one vaccine candidate in development.
“I would be very worried if you were betting the whole thing on one vaccine,” he said.
And when the vaccine is approved, experts say it’s very important that Americans get enough. If half the country is ready to be vaccinated, Collins warns, Covid-19 will stick for years.
“While I’m paying attention to the attitude I’m showing now about this vaccine and who would be interested in taking it,” Collins said at the National Press Club’s virtual event. “I’m very optimistic about how the vaccine is likely to be available by the end of the year, but if only 0% of Americans were interested, we would never reach that place of immunity. Going.
CNN’s Alta Spells, Shelby Lynn Erdman, Gisela Crespo, Naomi Thomas and Jacqueline Howard contributed to the report.
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