The US on Monday reached yet another grim new milestone, as its Covid-19 death toll exceeded 600,000, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University as monitored by Africa Today News, New York.
The coronavirus pandemic has now claimed more lives in the US than in any other country in the world.
Africa Today News, New York gathered that that across the United States, governments are loosening social distancing rules and relaxing mask mandates, and businesses are fully reopening amid a steady decline in COVID-19 cases and sustained progress in the nation’s vaccination campaign.
Yesterday, President Joe Biden explained that despite a nationwide drop in cases and hospitalisations, the disease ‘is still a real tragedy’ and is claiming an average of 370 people a day.
He urged Americans who have not been vaccinated to get jabs.
Speaking at a news press conference at a news conference at the NATO summit in Brussels, Belgium, he said; ‘If you’ve not been vaccinated, get vaccinated. Get vaccinated as soon as possible,’
‘We have more work to do to beat this virus. And now is not the time to let our guard down.’
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the current weekly average of new cases for the disease is 13,997 – a more than 94 percent drop from the peak back in January.
More than 64 percent of American adults have received at least one vaccination shot, according to the CDC. Biden wants to get to 70 percent by July 4, in time for Independence Day.
However, as COVID-19 cases wane across the US, vaccine-lagging areas still see risk and officials are concerned over the possible rise of the Delta variant, which health officials believe is more than 60 percent more transmissible.
The US is currently administering an average of 1.1 million shots a day, a drop from the average three million jabs a day back in April.
AFRICA TODAY NEWS, NEW YORK