BREAKING NEWS - US RECORDS MORE THAN 2000 DEATHS IN A SINGLE DAY, THE HIGHEST OF ANY COUNTRY THUS FAR

More than 2 000 deaths from the new coronavirus were recorded within 24 hours in the United States on Friday, according to Johns Hopkins University, making it the highest increase in deaths in one day since the global pandemic began.

The tally from the US-based university recorded 2 108 new deaths from Thursday to Friday evening, bringing the country's death toll to approximately 18,600.

The number of people infected with the novel coronavirus across the US has surpassed half a million, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins.

While there has been a trend towards the number of hospitalizations stabilizing across much of the US this week, deaths have been reaching new peaks.

The death toll is expected to lag behind the spread of the outbreak as many people succumb to the Covid-19 disease caused by the novel coronavirus weeks after being infected.

"It is in the sense of deaths a bad week," Anthony Fauci, one of the nation's top infectious disease experts, said during a press briefing on Thursday.

"At the same time as we're seeing the increase in deaths, we're seeing a rather dramatic decrease in the need for hospitalizations."

Almost 1.7 million infections had been recorded worldwide as of late Friday, and more than 100,000 people had died, according to Johns Hopkins.

via - IOL