US COVID-19 Cases Surpass 16 mln

According to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University, the number of COVID-19 cases in the United States rose to 16 million on Saturday.

The US COVID-19 caseload increased to 16,014,839, with 297,501 deaths as of 2126 GMT, according to the CSSE tally, reports Xinhua.

California reported the highest number of cases among the states, standing at 1,535,962. Texas reported 1,395,889 cases, followed by Florida with 1,116,973 cases. Illinois reported 841,688 cases, while New York documented 764,966 cases.

Other states with more than 420,000 cases include Ohio, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Tennessee and North Carolina, with data from the CSSE.

By far the US remains the nation worst hit by the pandemic, with the world's highest number of cases and deaths, accounting for more than 22 per cent of the global caseload.

US COVID-19 cases reached 10 million on Nov 9 and increased by 5 million in a month. It took only four days for the count to jump from 15 million to 16 million.

Record numbers of cases, deaths and hospitalizations were consistently seen across the states in December.

The daily cases in the US reached 231,775 on Friday, the highest single-day increase in new cases the country has ever witnessed since the pandemic began, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Friday also marked the 40th consecutive day that the US had reported more than 100,000 daily cases since the beginning of November.

Meanwhile, the country just went through the deadliest day since the onset of the pandemic, with the national daily deaths surging to 3,309 on Friday, the CSSE chart showed.

Current hospitalisations in the US skyrocketed to an all-time high of 108,108 on Friday, according to The COVID Tracking Project.

An updated model forecast by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington projected a total of 502,256 COVID-19 deaths in the United States by April 1, 2021, based on current projection scenario.

Meanwhile, states in the US will start receiving the first batch of the nation’s first COVID-19 vaccine from Monday morning, US officials said Saturday, after the government gave the final nod to the shots required to end the outbreak that has killed nearly 300,000 Americans.