The death toll from COVID-19 in the United States could exceed 500,000 by February unless nearly all Americans wear face masks, researchers said on Friday, as the country set a new single-day record for new cases.
Some 84,218 people were diagnosed with COVID-19 across the United States on Friday, according to a Reuters tally, breaking the single-day record of 77,299 that was set on July 16. Only India has reported more cases in a single day: 97,894, on September 17.
Alarm is also spreading across Europe as the number of coronavirus cases has more than doubled in 10 days, with several southern European countries reporting their highest daily case numbers this week. The entire continent reported more than 200,000 daily infections for the first time on Thursday, overtaking on that day the number of daily cases in India, Brazil and the United States combined.
According to the latest figures on Wednesday, 42,490,365 people have so far been infected with the novel coronavirus globally, with the deaths reaching 1,149,238 and recoveries amounting to 31,427,661.
The number of infections in the US has reached 8,746,953, of whom 229,284 have lost their lives.
In terms of infections, India comes next (7,814,682), followed by Brazil (5,355,650), Russia (1,480,646), Spain (1,110,372), Argentina (1,069,368), France (1,041,075), Colombia (998,942), Peru (883,116), Mexico (880,775), the UK (830,998), and South Africa (712,412), the figures showed.
They are followed by Iran. The country announced on Friday its highest single-day death toll and infection from the coronavirus with 335 and 6,134 respectively. Over 31,985 people have died there from the virus, with over 556,891 confirmed cases and 446,685 recoveries.
ZZ/