A rchive Date
[ 23-07-2020 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
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[https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/coronavirus-july-23-covid-19-1.5659882
Coronavirus: What's happening around the world on Thursday
Florida deaths rise for 5th consecutive day, U.S. jobless claims over 1M for 18th straight week
Thomson Reuters · Posted: Jul 23, 2020 7:53 AM ET
U.S. coronavirus cases topped four million on Thursday, with more than 2,600 new cases every hour on average, the highest rate in the world, according to a Reuters tally.
Infections in the United States have rapidly accelerated since the first case was detected on Jan. 21. It took the country 98 days to reach one million cases. It took another 43 days to reach two million and then 27 days to reach three million. It has only taken 16 days to reach four million, at a rate of 43 new cases a minute.
A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), published earlier this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, said that based on antibody tests, total case numbers between March and May were likely multiples higher than the official count.
U.S. deaths from the novel coronavirus rose by more than 1,100 for a second day in a row on Wednesday, including a record one-day rise in fatalities in Alabama, California, Nevada and Texas.
Florida on Thursday reported a record one-day increase in deaths from COVID-19, with 173 lives lost, for a cumulative total of to 5,632 deaths. It was the fifth straight day of rising casualties.
In Texas, one hard-hit county is storing bodies in refrigerated trucks after COVID-19 deaths doubled in the span of a week. Hidalgo County, at the southern tip of the state on the U.S. border with Mexico, has seen cases rise 60 per cent in the last week, according to a Reuters tally, with deaths doubling to more than 360.
Meanwhile, debate in the United States over restarting education has intensified, even as the pandemic flares up in dozens of states.
Donald Trump's administration has aggressively pushed for states and school districts to return to in-person instruction for the fall semester. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, in an interview last week with a conservative radio show, made the false claim that "kids are actually stoppers of the disease and they don't get it or transmit it themselves."
Trump will discuss a strategy to reopen the nation's schools at a briefing late Thursday afternoon, White House spokesperson Kayleigh McEnany told Fox News in an interview.
The CDC is expected to issue additional guidelines on how schools can safely reopen as early as this week.
The head of the World Health Organization's emergencies program on Wednesday cautioned schools to be careful about reopening until community transmission of the coronavirus is under control.
"We have to do everything possible to bring our children back to school, and the most effective thing we can do is to stop the disease in our community," Mike Ryan said. "Because if you control the disease in the community, you can open the schools."
In Washington, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is set to unveil a $1 trillion US COVID-19 rescue package on Thursday, pushing past an inner-party revolt over big spending and differences with the White House as the virus crisis worsens.
The package, called CARES II, is made up of separate bills from 10 senators as McConnell seeks to replicate an earlier strategy to launch negotiations with Democrats. But the path will be tougher this time. GOP senators and President Donald Trump are at odds over priorities, and Democrats say it's not nearly enough to stem the health crisis, reopen schools and extend aid to jobless Americans.
The urgency to get a deal done was illustrated by the latest unemployment figures. For an 18th consecutive week, jobless claims exceeded one million, according to the latest U.S. Labour Department release on Thursday.
The number of laid-off Americans seeking unemployment benefits actually rose last week for the first time since the pandemic struck in March, to 1.4 million. The previous week's total was 1.3 million.
An additional 975,000 applied for jobless aid under a separate program that has made self-employed and gig workers eligible for the first time. That figure isn't adjusted for seasonal trends, so it's reported separately.
In a video released Thursday by Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden's campaign, Biden and former president Barack Obama discuss the challenges the U.S. faces with respect to public health and the economy.
"If you want the economy growing again, people have to feel safe," said Obama.
©2020 CBC/Radio-Canada. All rights reserved.
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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