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As US
grapples
with
virus,
Florida
hits
record
case
increase
By
TAMARA
LUSH
and
PABLO
GORONDI
apnews.com
ST.
PETERSBURG,
Fla. -
With the
United
States
grappling
with the
worst
coronavirus
outbreak
in the
world,
Florida
hit a
grim
milestone
Sunday,
shattering
the
national
record
for a
state’s
largest
single-day
increase
in
positive
cases.
Deaths
from the
virus
have
also
been
rising
in the
U.S.,
especially
in the
South
and
West,
though
still
well
below
the
heights
hit in
April,
according
to a
recent
Associated
Press
analysis
of data
from
Johns
Hopkins
University.
“I
really
do think
we could
control
this,
and it’s
the
human
element
that is
so
critical.
It
should
be an
effort
of our
country.
We
should
be
pulling
together
when
we’re in
a
crisis,
and
we’re
definitely
not
doing
it,”
said
University
of
Florida
epidemiologist
Dr.
Cindy
Prins.
Adm.
Brett
Giroir,
a member
of the
White
House
coronavirus
task
force,
called
mask-wearing
in
public,
which
has been
met with
resistance
in some
U.S.
states,
“absolutely
essential.”
Giroir,
the
assistant
secretary
at the
Health
and
Human
Services
Department,
told
ABC’s
“This
Week” on
Sunday
that “if
we don’t
have
that, we
will not
get
control
of the
virus.”
President
Donald
Trump
wore a
mask in
public
for the
first
time
Saturday,
something
Democratic
House
Speaker
Nancy
Pelosi
said
Sunday
showed
he has
“crossed
a
bridge.”
Pelosi
told
CNN’s
“State
of the
Union”
that she
hopes it
means
the
president
“will
change
his
attitude,
which
will be
helpful
in
stopping
the
spread
of the
coronavirus.”
In
hard-hit
Houston,
Texas,
two top
Democratic
officials
called
for the
nation’s
fourth-largest
city to
lock
back
down as
area
hospitals
strained
to
accommodate
the
onslaught
of sick
patients.
In
Florida,
where
parts of
Walt
Disney
World
reopened
Saturday,
15,299
people
tested
positive,
for a
total of
269,811
cases,
and 45
deaths
were
recorded,
according
to state
Department
of
Health
statistics
reported
Sunday.
California
had the
previous
record
of daily
positive
cases —
11,694,
set on
Wednesday.
The
numbers
come at
the end
of a
record-breaking
week as
Florida
reported
514
fatalities
— an
average
of 73
per day.
Three
weeks
ago, the
state
was
averaging
30
deaths
per day.
Researchers
expect
deaths
to rise
in the
U.S. for
at least
some
weeks,
but some
think
the
count
probably
will not
go up as
dramatically
as it
did in
the
spring
because
of
several
factors,
including
increased
testing.
The
World
Health
Organization,
meanwhile,
reported
another
record
increase
in the
number
of
confirmed
coronavirus
cases
over a
24-hour
period,
at over
230,000.
The
U.N.
health
agency
said the
United
States
again
topped
the list
among
countries,
with
more
than
66,000
cases.
The
figures
don’t
necessarily
account
for
delays
in
reporting
cases,
and are
believed
to far
underestimate
actual
totals.
Countries
in
Eastern
Europe
were
among
those
facing
rising
waves of
new
infections,
leading
to riots
in
Serbia,
mandatory
face
masks in
Croatia
and
travel
bans or
quarantines
imposed
by
Hungary.
“We
see
worrisome
signs
about an
increase
in the
number
of cases
in the
neighboring
countries,
Europe
and the
whole
world,”
said
Gergely
Gulyas,
Hungarian
Prime
Minister
Viktor
Orban’s
chief of
staff.
“Now, we
have to
protect
our own
security
and
prevent
the
virus
from
being
brought
in from
abroad.”
Hungarian
authorities
said
Sunday
they
have
sorted
countries
into
three
categories
— red,
yellow
and
green —
based on
their
rates of
new
coronavirus
infections,
and will
impose
restrictions,
including
entry
bans and
mandatory
quarantines,
depending
on which
country
people
are
arriving
from.
Serbia,
where
health
authorities
are
warning
that
hospitals
are
almost
full due
to the
latest
surge,
reported
287 new
infections
on
Sunday,
although
there
have
been
increasing
doubts
about
the
accuracy
of the
figures.
Officially,
the
country
has over
18,000
confirmed
infections
and 382
deaths
since
March.
Sunday’s
report
of 11
coronavirus
deaths
was the
country’s
second-highest
daily
death
toll.
Serbian
police
clashed
with
anti-government
protesters
for four
nights
last
week,
demonstrations
that
forced
the
Serbian
president
to
withdraw
plans to
reintroduce
a
coronavirus
lockdown.
Many of
the
increasing
infections
have
been
blamed
on
crowded
soccer
matches,
tennis
events
and
nightclubs.
In
Bulgaria,
authorities
reintroduced
restrictions
lifted a
few
weeks
ago
because
of a new
surge in
cases.
Albania
also has
seen a
significant
increase
in
infections
since
mid-May,
when it
eased
lockdown
measures.
The
Balkan
nation
reported
93 new
cases,
over
twice as
many as
the
highest
daily
figures
in March
and
April,
and the
health
ministry
called
the
situation
at the
main
infectious
disease
hospital
“grave.”
Croatia,
whose
island-dotted
Adriatic
Sea
coast is
a major
tourist
destination,
is
making
wearing
masks
mandatory
in
stores
beginning
Monday.
Yet
the
numbers
of
infections
in
Eastern
Europe
pale in
comparison
to daily
coronavirus
reports
from
India,
South
Africa
and
Brazil,
whose
virus-denying
president
has
tested
positive.
India,
which
has the
most
cases
after
the
United
States
and
Brazil,
saw a
record
surge of
28,637
cases
reported
in the
past 24
hours.
Authorities
also
announced
a
weeklong
lockdown
beginning
Tuesday
in the
key
southern
technology
hub of
Bangalore,
where
the
offices
of top
tech
companies
like
Microsoft,
Apple
and
Amazon
are
located.
South
Africa
has
reported
over
10,000
new
daily
cases
for
several
days in
a row,
including
13,497
new
infections
announced
Saturday
night.
Johannesburg’s
densely
populated
Soweto
township
is one
of the
virus
hot
spots.
With
over
264,000
cases
and
3,971
deaths,
South
Africa
accounts
for over
40% of
all the
reported
coronavirus
cases in
Africa.
South
African
President
Cyril
Ramaphosa
said
Sunday
the
country
would
return
to a ban
of
alcohol
sales to
reduce
the
volume
of
trauma
patients
so that
hospitals
have
more
beds to
treat
COVID-19.
The
country
is also
reinstating
a night
curfew
to
reduce
traffic
accidents
and has
made it
mandatory
for all
residents
to wear
face
masks in
public.
Meanwhile,
in
Taiwan,
which
kept its
coronavirus
outbreak
to a few
hundred
cases,
an
annual
film
festival
wrapped
up with
an
awards
ceremony
this
weekend
where
actors
and
others
lined up
for
photo
shoots
with no
social
distancing,
and
participants
didn’t
wear
masks.
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