Number of US Covid-19 cases smashes past 90,000

The tally from Johns Hopkins University indicates that the number of cases in the US hit 92,932 on Friday, a dramatic one-day surge of 7,576 cases on its previous figure.

The increase saw it overtake Italy, which briefly had the most confirmed cases of any country in the world when its official count of infections reached 86,498 on Friday.

Friday was the Mediterranean country’s worst day yet, as it recorded 919 deaths in just 24 hours. The figure is by far the highest single-day death toll in any country in the world since the pandemic began.

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The most recent figures released by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that 1,246 people have died from Covid-19 in the US. That statistic places the US as having the sixth highest death toll from the virus in the world behind Italy, Spain, China, Iran and France. However, that figure is expected to rise later on Friday.

New York is the worst-hit state in the country, recording 365 deaths. Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Friday that the state estimates that demand for hospital capacity won’t peak for another three weeks. Cuomo announced plans to build eight temporary hospitals in a bid to cope with the expected surge in patients.

The worldwide death toll from Covid-19 passed the grim milestone of 25,000 earlier on Friday. Europe is the worst-hit continent with over 18,000 falling victim to the disease. The Johns Hopkins tally shows that there are over 565,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus around the world. It says that over 127,500 people have recovered from the illness across the globe.

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