Coronavirus deaths in the United States exceeded 450,000 on Thursday, and daily deaths remain stubborn at more than 3,000 a day, despite falling infections and the arrival of several vaccines.
Infectious disease experts expect deaths to begin to decline soon, after new cases peaked earlier this year. New deaths from COVID-19 could drop as early as next week, said the new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But there is also a risk that improving trends in infections and hospitalizations may be offset by people relaxing and reuniting – including this Sunday, to watch football, she added.
“I’m worried about Super Bowl Sunday, quite frankly,” Dr. Rochelle Walensky said in an interview with The Associated Press on Thursday.
Walensky said one of the reasons why cases and hospitalizations are not growing as dramatically as they were a few weeks ago is that the effect of holiday gatherings has disappeared.
The effect on deaths is delayed. The daily number rises to 50,000 new deaths in the last two weeks alone.
“We’re still in a pretty bad place,” she said.
The nation reported 3,912 deaths on Wednesday through COVID-19, down from the pandemic peak of 4,466 deaths on January 12th.
The largest engine of deaths in the United States in the last month was California, which recorded an average of over 500 deaths a day in recent weeks.
Dora Padilla was among the thousands of Californians who died last month.
The 86-year-old daughter of Mexican immigrants served for two decades as a school administrator for the Alhambra Unified School District in Southern California, after volunteering as a parent and strengthening her own children’s band. She was one of the few Latin Americans to hold elected office at the time.
He gave positive results in December at the unit where he lived, then developed a fever and saw a decrease in oxygen levels. The facility was to call an ambulance, but decided to treat her there, amid an increase in infections that filled local hospitals with virus patients, said her daughter Lisa Jones.
“They were almost ready to call an ambulance, but they realized it was nowhere to go. It’s going to end up in a hallway, “Jones said.
Padilla had been stable for days and seemed to be improving, but suddenly fell ill again before dying.
“I’m still a little numb,” said her daughter.
California’s experience has reflected many of the inequalities that have been exposed since the beginning of the pandemic almost a year ago, with people of color being particularly affected.
For example, Latinos make up 46% of the total death toll in California, despite the fact that they make up 39% of the state’s population. The situation has worsened in recent months. In November, the daily number of Latino deaths was 3.5 per 100,000 population, but the rate was as high as 40 deaths per 100,000 weeks.
Alabama is another hot spot. The seven-day average death toll has risen in the past two weeks, from 74 to 147 deaths a day. Kentucky, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Tennessee also saw increases in deaths.
The hardest-hit demographics continue to be the oldest and most fragile, said Dr. Thomas Holland of Duke University.
When the coronavirus first crossed the country, it was concentrated in nursing homes, prisons and other congregated nursing homes. It later spread more widely.
“But the deaths were still concentrated among elderly patients and patients with other health problems,” Holland said. “Even though the pandemic has spread more widely in the population, the demographics of those dying from COVID have not really changed.”
In Florida, for example, 83% of deaths due to the virus were in people aged 65 and over.
However, this was not enough to inspire some people to wear masks. A recent viral video from Oakes Farms Seed to Table, a local grocery store in Naples, Florida, showed both masked customers and employees talking and laughing without any social distance.
Said Alfie Oakes, the store’s owner NBC’s “Today” program knows the masks aren’t working and doesn’t believe the coronavirus has killed hundreds of thousands in the United States.
“It’s a total pig wash,” Oakes said, adding, “Why don’t we shut down the world because of heart attacks? Why don’t we close cities because of heart attacks? ”
He did not return a call from the AP on Thursday.
Public health experts are watching Florida closely this week as the Super Bowl is played in Tampa. City and NFL leaders are trying to ensure social distancing by limiting participation to one-third of the stadium’s capacity – 22,000 people. However, there will be parties, events at bars and clubs and other activities that attract people.
While most people who become infected will recover, others face a much longer journey. It can take a week or two to get sick enough to get to the hospital. Then, the seriously ill can end up in an intensive care unit for several weeks, and some will die.
Patients who do not do well are often for these long and very stormy courses, and patients who die, which is usually weeks after their hospitalization, said Holland.
Treatments have evolved for COVID over time, but there have been no “game-changing miracle treatments” like vaccine development, Holland said.
“I’ve had things on the sidelines that are useful,” Holland said.
These include the use of steroids for patients in need of oxygen, various ventilation strategies and the prevention and management of blood clots. There is also the use of monoclonal antibodies for outpatients at the beginning of the disease, which should not be oxygen, but which could present a higher risk of complications.
In addition, the test changes helped.
“Clearly, if people know they are infected, they will be more likely to do the things they need to do, such as stay home and quarantine or isolate themselves,” he said.
Looking ahead, the big concern is how the virus changes, shifting to new strains that are potentially more infectious and more able to evade antibody products or make vaccines less effective.
“I’ve always been in a race,” Holland said. But it is much more obvious now that we are in a race to vaccinate people fast enough to slow down transmission so that the virus has fewer opportunities to move and change and create these strain problems for us.
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Associated Press writers Mike Stobbe of New York City and Tamara Lush of St. Petersburg, Florida, contributed to this report.