The number of COVID-19 deaths in the United States topped 71, 921 on Tuesday, representing over a quarter of all the virus deaths reported worldwide, as Americans give negative marks for the federal government’s handling of the outbreak.
The U.S. novel coronavirus death toll reached 70,115 as of 2:15 p.m. (1815 GMT), according to the Centre for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.
The country has reported 1,192,119 cases of infections, also the highest in the world, showed the tally.
The state of New York suffered the most, with 321,192 cases and 25,073 deaths. Other hardest-hit states included New Jersey with 8,244 deaths, Michigan with 4,139 deaths, and Massachusetts with 4,090 deaths, the data showed.
While Americans overwhelmingly think highly of what federal scientists have done to deal with the contagion, they continue to give President Donald Trump negative marks for his handling of the coronavirus outbreak, showed The Washington Post-University of Maryland poll released on Tuesday.
The poll surveyed a random national sample of 1,005 adults by phone from April 28 to May 3. It has a 3.5-point margin of error.
Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, earned 74 percent of positive rating and won widespread bipartisan consent, showed the poll.
The nation’s top infectious disease expert gained approval from more than two-thirds of Republicans and independents, and nearly 9 in 10 Democrats.
Trump’s ratings are 44 percent positive and 56 percent negative, with nearly 80 percent Republicans but just about 20 percent Democrats viewing Trump positively as relates to the pandemic, said the poll.
Also, the poll indicated a majority of Americans oppose reopening most businesses despite such measures are being taken in a phased manner in more and more states across the country.
Respondents are most opposed to reopening movie theatres, with 82 of them saying so. Meanwhile, 78 percent said they don’t want gyms to reopen, while 74 percent are opposed to the reopening of dine-in restaurants and nail salons.
As for other types of business, 70 percent oppose reopening gun stores, followed by barber shops and hair salons with 69 percent opposition.
Sixty-six percent oppose reopening clothing retailers while 59 percent oppose reopening golf courses, the poll showed.
Trump said Tuesday that he will allow 79-year-old Fauci, a key member of the White House coronavirus response team, to testify before the Republican-controlled Senate next week, but that the expert will be barred from appearing in the House, where the Democrats hold a majority.
After weeks of shutdown measures, many U.S. states have begun to slowly open up. But health experts have expressed concerns that premature opening could lead to a spike in new COVID-19 infections.
An influential COVID-19 model produced by the University of Washington revised its projections on Monday, estimating more than 134,000 COVID-19 deaths in the United States through August.
The revised projections reflect rising mobility in most U.S. states as well as the easing of social distancing measures expected in 31 states by May 11, indicating that growing contacts among people will promote transmission of the coronavirus, according to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME). – Xinhua.
