Wednesday morning’s figures for the spread of COVID-19 confirmed that the world has passed the one million confirmed new cases for a single day. Tuesday’s one-day total reached 1,314,000, pushing the 7-day average up to 929,500/day – also a record high. (Technically, the Monday one-day total was higher, but that figure included, in more than a few places, testing that was done during the previous weekend, and not reported until Monday.) Three countries, the United States (381,000), France (180,000) and the United Kingdom (113,800), each set new records, and together accounted for over 50% of all the reported cases in the world!
In the US, California (49,400) caught up with New York (48,800) in new cases, and together with newly re-emerging Florida (29,000) and Texas (15,400), the four states have over 35% of the new cases in the country. Hospitalizations (72,000) and Covid deaths (over 1,500/day) in the US continue to rise. Even if Omicron turns out to be a milder infection overall, one can’t quadruple the cases in two-to-three weeks and expect the absolute number of serious illnesses to drop.
