On Friday and Saturday, the United States reported 30,000 new cases of Coronavirus, its largest number since May 1st.
This is an on-going “first wave” cluster for most states, defying the belief that the US has entered its second wave. In states like New York which was hit the hardest during March, cases have seem to subside.
Nationwide, cases have risen 15% over the last two weeks. Cases are rising in 18 states across the South, West and Midwest.
Now, it’s hitting the bigger states, the midwest and so forth. This could mean it gets harder to contain, particularly with states re-opening, businesses re-emerging and restaurants going back to a sanitized, semi-normal.
Seven states hit record cases on Saturday, including Florida and South Carolina. Florida reported 4,049 new cases on Saturday and South Carolina reported 1,157 new cases.
California reported 4,515 new cases on Sunday, the highest one-day increase since the start of the pandemic. Los Angeles County accounted for 47% of the total number of cases statewide.
Also on Sunday, Missouri reported 397 new cases and Oklahoma reported 478 new cases, both breaking their own records.
However, deaths have dropped dramatically. This is likely because the virus has infected younger people in their 20s-30s since states re-opened. Officials are warning that some clusters of infections are apparent among younger people who are crowding bars and parties.
New daily cases in the US appeared to be going down throughout May into early June, but ticked up when states re-opened. This was expected though, and mostly part of the new normal reality we’ll see in the world for some time.
“I don’t think this is going to slow down. I’m not sure the influenza analogy applies anymore.I don’t think we’re going to see one, two and three wave”.
“I think we’re just going to see one very very difficult forest fire of cases,” said Dr. Michael Osterholm, the director for the Center of Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.
