5 tips from Anthony Fauci against covid-19 12:29
(CNN) - Do you remember the progress made in removing the covid-19 during the painful economic closings?
In some states, many of those advances have been lost after an abysmal July that shattered records of new cases, hospitalizations, or deaths from coronavirus.
"I want to be very clear: what we are seeing today is different from March and April," Dr. Deborah Birx, coordinator of the White House coronavirus task force, told CNN's Dana Bash this Sunday.
"It is extraordinarily widespread. This epidemic at the moment is different… and it is both rural and urban ».
- Why did Florida become the epicenter of the pandemic in the United States?
In the past month, the United States has had:
- The highest number of new covid-19 cases since the pandemic began
- Rising test positivity rates in 32 states
- Record hospitalizations or deaths in several states
- 10 days with more than 1,000 new deaths from covid-19
Now the race is on trying to control the covid-19 before more classrooms reopen, and before more states have to close again.
Almost 2 million new cases in one month
July had the highest number of new cases of any month since the pandemic began, with more than 1.9 million new cases, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
And that's not just because of the tests.
While the number of tests performed has increased, the test positivity rate has also increased. This means that a higher percentage of the tests carried out are positive.
If the increase in new case numbers had been the result of an increase in testing, "the positive percentage line might look flat or as if it were decreasing during the time period when cases increased," according to Johns Hopkins University. .
But that is not what is happening. As of Sunday, 32 states had higher test positivity rates during the past week compared to the previous week, suggesting "increased transmission," Johns Hopkins said on his Coronavirus Resource Center website.
"If we see the percentage of positive tests start to increase, it indicates insufficient tests to detect infections that may be occurring," said Johns Hopkins. "Not finding these infections can mean that the virus is transmitted without intervention, which can lead to future growth of cases."
- 260 employees in the Georgia school district have tested positive for covid-19 or have been exposed to the coronavirus
Record in hospitalizations and deaths from covid-19
While the numbers in some states are beginning to improve, several states have recently experienced their highest number of hospitalizations or deaths from covid-19, two metrics that cannot be attributed to increased testing.
- Florida broke its daily record for new covid-19 deaths every day for four days in a row. On July 31, the state reported an additional 257 deaths, beating its previous record of 253 deaths the day before.
- Last Wednesday, California reported 197 deaths, its highest number of coronavirus deaths in a single day. That broke California's grim previous record of 159, set just a week earlier.
- Last Tuesday, North Carolina reported a record number of 1,244 hospitalizations for covid-19.
- Texas broke its hospitalization record twice in two days. On July 21, the lone star status had 10,848 covid-19 patients. The next day, the number increased to 10,893 hospitalized patients.
Credit: Tobias Schwarz / AFP / Getty Images
- Texas also reported 197 deaths on July 23, the highest daily death toll since the start of the pandemic.
- Arizona reported 147 deaths on July 18, its highest daily number of deaths from covid-19.
- Tennessee reported 37 deaths on July 23, its highest number of deaths in a single day.
- Record covid-19 cases reported to WHO in last 24 hours
Why are these revivals happening?
Some medical experts say states reopened too soon, far from meeting national guidelines on reopening.
Others point to many Americans' lack of personal responsibility, such as not wearing a mask or ignoring social estrangement after the reopening of states.
"There are three or four types of epidemics" that are fueling the spread, said William Haseltine, president and president of ACCESS Health International. They include:
- Young people who socialize and ignore physical distance
- Essential workers who are in frequent contact with members of the public
- People living in overcrowded conditions
- People in nursing homes or correctional facilities where the virus can easily spread
"But there is another one that worries me a lot, which is our schools," Haseltine said.
"The latest data shows that children under the age of five have between 10 and 100 times more viruses in their noses" compared to older children and adults.
Is there any good news?
Yes. Some states have falling rates of infection, hospitalizations, and deaths, paving the way for a full economic reopening.
The most successful states demanded face masks early, began to reopen later than others, and found innovative solutions to combat the virus.
And while the United States still has a hard time proving shortages and delays, making it difficult to isolate those infected, many of the steps necessary to override covid-19 are pretty easy.
The two most important steps are social distancing and wearing a face mask when you need to come in contact with others, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
"It is not rocket science," he told CNN in late July. "If we all did (both) uniformly, I think we could change things."
- CNN's Tina Burnside, Cheri Mossburg, Raja Razek and Jamiel Lynch contributed to this report.
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