The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus pandemic is set to reach 200,000 by Labor Day, as children across the country prepare to return to school, according to a forecast by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC).
The rate of new deaths could increase in the next four weeks in California and Colorado and decline in Arizona, the CDC said. More than 160,000 people have died from Covid-19 in America, although scientists have indicated that the number of excessive deaths so far this year is even higher.
“Covid-19 deaths could be undercounted if the pandemic could also increase in other types of deaths. “It’s probably some of both,” said Ronald Fricker, a professor of statistics at Virginia Tech. “Whatever the reason, the Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in substantially more deaths than would otherwise have happened, and it’s not over yet.”
The grim projection comes as states outside the U.S. Northeast continue to fight to dampen a rise in new infections, with California on Thursday becoming the first state to register 600,000 Covid cases.
A summer leap into new infections prompted California to close bars and dining for a second time, though Governor Gavin Newsom said this week that the state is “turning the corner on this pandemic,” citing a drop in new hospitalizations.
The ongoing crisis, shattered by a crippling government response to contain the virus and the spread of misinformation about mask wear and touting miracle cures to stem the outbreak, could end up being deadly or worse than the 1918 flu pandemic, researchers have warned.
When improvements in hygiene and modern medicine are considered, the increase in deaths in the first months of the Covid-19 pandemic was “substantially greater” than during the peak of the 1918 event, a study has found.
Despite the increasing death toll, the Donald Trump administration continues to press on schools to reopen as normal. Schools in several states are already back, often with adverse consequences – more than 2,000 students and faculty in five states have been quarantined following several hundred positive Covid-19 cases.
In only one school district in Georgia, 1,100 students had to be isolated at home due to an outbreak of the virus. Trump has said the risk of the virus to children is “very, very low”, although experts have warned that this should not comfort parents.
“It’s not fair to say that this virus is completely benign in children,” Sean O’Leary, vice president of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases, told CNN. “We’ve already had 90 deaths in children in the U.S., in just a few months.”
In Arizona, recently a hotspot for infections, some teachers have resigned in protest of the decision to teach in person. But Doug Ducey, the state’s mayor, said wearing masks and preventing crowds had helped improve the situation.
“Overall, the hard work and sacrifices pay off,” he said. “I want to thank Arizonans for their efforts, and the message is to stay the course, not stop, keep waiting.”
Ducey said he was disappointed that football games were not being returned to the state, common with the rest of the country, even though Thursday night saw a game in high school in Utah. The Trump administration has called for a return to school and college sports, claiming that young athletes are at less risk than older people, despite the risk that they could spread the virus to others.
Many athletic bodies remain cautious, however, with the NCAA basketball championships confirming on Thursday that the competition will not take place in the fall due to a lack of participation in schools. ‘We can not [hold championships] in every Division I NCAA championship sport now, that’s anything but FBS football going on this fall, ”said NCAA President Mark Emmert. “Unfortunately, tragically, that will be the case this fall, complete stop.”
Meanwhile, efforts to crack down on a coronavirus vaccine are moving forward, with Reuters reporting that U.S. government scientists are working on a strain of the virus to intentionally infect healthy volunteers who have been vaccinated.
The work is preliminary and such so-called challenge studies would not replace large-scale, three-phase trials such as those currently being tested in the United States by experimental Covid-19 vaccines from Moderna Inc and Pfizer Inc, according to a statement sent to Reuters by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (Niaid), part of the National Institutes of Health.
U.S. officials organizing the fight against the pandemic have been under pressure from advocacy groups such as 1 Day Sooner and others who see challenge trials as a way to speed up tests of a Covid-19 vaccine. Most vaccine studies rely on inadvertent infection, which can take time to prevent. Some drugmakers, including AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, have said they would consider human challenge testing to test Covid-19 vaccines as needed.
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