US breaks its one-day record with 865 Covid-19 fatalities, but peak not expected until mid-April

The US has shattered its one-day record for Covid-19 fatalities, with 865 deaths on Tuesday alone as the lethal illness rapidly spreads in major hotspots across the country.

With more than 188,000 confirmed cases nationwide, the world’s leading epicenter for Covid-19 has achieved another grim milestone. Data gathered by Johns Hopkins University shows the US broke its own record for the number of deaths recorded in a single day. The 865 new fatalities bring the total US death toll to 3,873, well surpassing China, where the coronavirus outbreak originated last December.

Though both cases and deaths are on the rise in the US – particularly in New York, where nearly half of the country’s fatalities have been reported – the outbreak has yet to reach its peak. A model created by the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation predicts a sharp spike in fatalities in the coming weeks, suggesting the outbreak will reach its apex sometime in mid-April, at which point the country could see more than 2,200 deaths per day.

During the daily briefing earlier on Tuesday, the White House’s coronavirus task force projected that up to 240,000 patients could succumb to the disease in the best-case scenario, with a top expert on the team, Dr. Anthony Fauci, warning Americans to prepare for a six-figure death toll. While Dr. Fauci said he hoped aggressive containment efforts would reduce that number, even the more optimistic models suggest the worst is yet to come.

Italy still leads the world in coronavirus fatalities with more than 12,000, and faces one of the highest mortality rates at over 11 percent, though health experts have noted that the actual number of infections in the Mediterranean nation likely far exceeds those confirmed by tests, suggesting the real death rate is much lower.

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