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In February, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that the United States should brace for a domestic coronavirus outbreak. Just one month later, the World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 a pandemic, and President Trump announced a national state of emergency. Over the past eight months, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 has risen dramatically, with nearly 48 million across the globe. But the U.S. has suffered the largest outbreak in the world. As of November 4, more than 9.5 million people across every state, Washington, D.C., and four territories have tested positive for the disease, and more than 234,000 people with the virus have died.
With coronavirus cases surging across the country, we’re solidly in the midst of a “third wave” of COVID-19, which is shaping up to be our worst yet. Last week alone, the U.S. saw a staggering half a million new cases, and more than 20 states reported record daily levels. On Wednesday, for the first time since the start of the pandemic, the U.S. recorded more than 100,000 new cases in a single day.
Here’s everything to know about the spread of the virus in the U.S.
How many new coronavirus cases have been confirmed in the U.S.?
As of November 4, there have been at least 9,571,900 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S., and the death toll is now at least 234,196.
Back in May, President Trump predicted that the U.S. would see “anywhere from 75,000, 80,000, to 100,000” fatalities from the virus. Now, the U.S. has reported more deaths from COVID-19 than any other country. Though the U.S. accounts for 4 percent of the world’s population, it has had around 20 percent of the world’s coronavirus deaths — by far the largest gap of any affluent country. Still, many public-health experts believe that the official numbers significantly underestimate the pandemic’s true toll. If current trends continue, the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation estimates that the death toll could reach 378,000 by the end of the year.
Though cases had been on a downward trajectory after the widespread lockdowns in March and April, the virus spread rapidly throughout the summer — especially in regions of the country that were early to reopen, including the South and West. Now, with cooler weather pushing people indoors, we are seeing another surge in cases. Over the past week, the country has reported an average of 88,168 new cases per day, a 46 percent increase from the average just two weeks earlier. The country also continues to break new records for daily cases almost as soon as it sets them: Six days after the U.S. reported a record 85,000 new cases in a single day, on October 29, the daily tally surpassed 90,000. Then, the very next day, the country reported more than 99,000 new cases. On Wednesday, the U.S. surpassed another troubling milestone, clocking over 100,000 new cases for the first time since the pandemic began — a number public health officials expect will only continue to grow.
Texas has had the largest outbreak in the country, recording more than 983,227 cases, and California has reported 954,143. New York, the early epicenter of the pandemic, has recorded a total of 520,557 cases. Now, the worst outbreaks are occurring in rural areas within the Upper Midwest, the Great Plains, and the Mountain West, although the Northeast is also seeing renewed spikes. Wisconsin — where the seven-day positivity rate has surpassed 30 percent — has opened a field hospital. North Dakota how has the highest number of cases per capita in the country, the New York Times reports. With hospitalizations rising rapidly in many parts of the country, officials have warned that facilities in Utah, Tennessee, Texas, and the island of Lanai, Hawaii, are approaching their limits. Overall, the national trajectory is alarming and shows no sign of improving anytime soon.
Public-health experts expected this. On October 18, Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, told NBC that “the next six to 12 weeks are going to be the darkest of the entire pandemic.” Of particular concern right now is Thanksgiving and the holiday season, as public-health experts say that small indoor gatherings are driving new COVID-19 outbreaks. “You get one person who’s asymptomatic and infected and then all of a sudden, four or five people in that gathering are infected,” Fauci said during a livestreamed interview this week. “To me, that’s the exact scenario that you’re going to see on Thanksgiving.”
The largest COVID-19 outbreaks have been in nursing homes, correctional facilities, and meat-processing plants. Additionally, federal data shows that Black and Latino people in the U.S. have been three times as likely to contract the virus as white people and that they have been nearly twice as likely to die from it. While elderly and immunocompromised people accounted for a large share of COVID-19 infections at the start of the pandemic, in recent months, younger people have been testing positive more than any other age group, and many outbreaks have been linked to schools and universities that have resumed in-person classes. Last week, more than 61,000 children across the country tested positive for COVID-19, more than any other week during the pandemic, the American Academy of Pediatrics reported.
How long will it take to reopen the country?
The widespread lockdowns of March and April have had serious economic consequences, with more than 857,000 workers filing new claims for unemployment benefits in the last week of September. Researchers at Harvard have estimated that nearly 110,000 small businesses closed permanently between early March and early May, and during the same period, an estimated 5.4 million American workers lost their health insurance.
While public-health experts are hesitant to lay out any sort of definitive timeline about reopening, the general consensus is that things won’t go back to normal until late next year at the earliest. If we get an effective vaccine early next year and people continue wearing masks and social distancing, “then we could get the level of infection down so low in the community that by the third-quarter end of 2021, we could start thinking in terms of normal,” Dr. Fauci told a Senate committee in September. But before then, we’ll likely see that states will scale back their reopenings, or even go back into lockdown, which we’re already seeing in Europe, where COVID cases are yet again surging.
What has been the federal response to the pandemic?
In March, President Trump declared a national emergency over the coronavirus pandemic, effectively freeing up to $50 billion in federal funds to help states and territories fight the spread of the virus, which he said would include expanding access to testing. He also signed a $2 trillion stimulus plan, the largest in modern American history, which sent direct payments of around $1,200 to millions of Americans who earn less than $99,000, along with an additional $500 per child. Negotiations on a second, scaled-back aid proposal bill have been ongoing, although on October 6, the president ordered Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to put everything on hold until after the election, claiming that “immediately after I win, we will pass a major Stimulus Bill that focuses on hardworking Americans and Small Business.” Disagreement over proposed plans continues apace.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to overturn the Affordable Care Act. If it succeeds, which looks increasingly likely with the rushed confirmation of Supreme Court justice Amy Coney Barrett, as many as 23 million Americans would lose access to their health insurance.
President Trump has repeatedly downplayed the seriousness of the current outbreaks and told his supporters at a rally in Ohio in September that the virus “affects virtually nobody.” He has previously, falsely, claimed that “99 percent” of cases are “totally harmless” — despite the fact that he told journalist Bob Woodward in early February that he knew the virus was airborne and “more deadly than even your strenuous flus.” On October 1, Trump announced that he and Melania had tested positive for coronavirus. Although he reportedly worried he “could be one of the diers,” after being treated with several different drugs, Trump was back to holding large public events one week later, repeating his claim that coronavirus is “disappearing.”
Infections within the president’s orbit have continued to climb in recent weeks — thanks in part to an apparent super-spreader event he recently held in the Rose Garden. And as of October 25, five people in Vice-President Mike Pence’s orbit — including his chief of staff and his “body man” — have tested positive for coronavirus. (Pence and his wife have reportedly tested negative.)
When will we get a coronavirus vaccine?
Fauci had previously said a vaccine would not be ready until at least the end of this year or early 2021. Moncef Slaoui, the chief adviser to the White House vaccine program, said he believed a vaccine would be available by the end of the year, and that there would be enough doses available to immunize the U.S. population “by the middle of 2021.” (However, it’s likely that a vaccine for children may not be available until much later.) Nine drug companies have issued a joint pledge not to distribute a vaccine until it has been thoroughly vetted, and Governor Andrew Cuomo has said that New York would form a panel of experts to review the safety of any vaccine put forward by the federal government. Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports that the U.S. will not join a global effort to develop and distribute a vaccine, in part because the WHO is involved.
Meanwhile, other potential coronavirus treatments are undergoing clinical studies to determine their efficacy. On October 22, the Food and Drug Administration formally approved the country’s first treatment for COVID-19, the anti-viral drug remdesivir, which the FDA commissioner called “an important scientific milestone in the COVID-19 pandemic.”
What should I do to minimize my coronavirus risk?
In most cases, COVID-19 is not fatal, but it appears to pose the greatest risk to elderly people and those with preexisting conditions. According to the CDC, eight out of ten deaths from COVID-19 in the U.S. have been adults age 65 and older. Doctors and medical workers may also be at greater risk, due to their higher-than-average odds of exposure.
The two best ways to protect yourself and others from the coronavirus, according to public-health experts, is to wear a face mask and practice social distancing. (Thirty-three states plus Washington, D.C. require residents to wear masks in public settings when social distancing is not possible.) Also, maybe consider lowering the decibel of your voice, as some research shows that speaking quietly instead of yelling — which sends an abundance of respiratory droplets and aerosols out into the air — can lower the rate of virus transmission.
If you have symptoms associated with coronavirus — particularly coughing, fever, respiratory issues — call your doctor before showing up at their office: The virus is highly contagious and you want to limit the possibility of spreading it. If you are sick, the CDC recommends that you stay home and self-isolate, confining yourself to one room as much as possible and wearing a mask when you have to interact with others. Wash your hands frequently — soap and water and at least 20 seconds of scrubbing — and avoid touching shared household items, cleaning “high touch” surfaces (like your phone) regularly.
Regardless of whether or not you have symptoms, though, keep your hands clean, and seriously, stop touching your face and just stay home.
This post is being updated daily with new developments.
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