The Trump administration has not fought against the pandemic. By the time Biden officially entered the White House, the number of coronavirus deaths in the United States had exceeded 400,000.
According to the latest forecast of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 100,000 Americans will die of COVID-19 in the next three weeks, and the total number of deaths will exceed the 500,000 mark.
According to Johns Hopkins University statistics, 4,000 Americans died of COVID-19 on the 20th, which is the third time that the number of new deaths in the United States in a single day has exceeded this figure and brought the cumulative total number of deaths to 40,6001.
According to a CNN report on the morning of the 21st, according to the latest comprehensive forecast released by the CDC, the cumulative number of COVID-19 deaths in the United States will reach 508,000 on February 13.
About a week ago (13th), the CDC predicted that the number of coronavirus deaths in the United States would reach 477,000 by February 6.
According to the latest CDC forecast, about three weeks after Biden took office, there will be more than 4,000 new deaths every day.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, an infectious disease expert in the United States who has just taken up the position of the CDC, said that the death data in the United States are “really heartbreaking”, but Walensky said that “the pandemic will be reduced in the future”.
But CNN said that to reach what Valensky called the “future”, the United States needs to accelerate the pace of testing and vaccination.
Meanwhile, the vaccine has begun to be distributed, but state officials say the supply is insufficient.
The situation of the “epicenter” of the pandemic is still grim.
As the most affected area in the United States, California’s pandemic data indicators are still stretching, and the number of severe patients and deaths are worrying.
On the 20th, 22,403 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 694 new deaths were reported in California.
The number of daily additions is far lower than the average daily number of new deaths in the state – 38,000, but the number of new deaths per day reached the second highest in history.
The death rate of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in the Los Angeles area has almost doubled in recent months, CNN said.
Los Angeles County, the first county in the state to exceed 1 million confirmed cases, local health officials also said on the 20th that the mortality rate of patients admitted to the hospital is currently about 23%.
The county health department also said that the average number of days in hospital for COVID-19 patients increased from the original seven days to nine and a half days; this data reflects the increase in the proportion of severe patients.
However, the local vaccine supply is worrying.
California epidemiologist Erica Pan said it could take four to five months to vaccinate all people over the state over 65.
According to CNN’s previous report, County officials were forced to temporarily release the limit on cremation because of the high death toll and the death toll was stranded in hospitals and autopsy departments.
The shortage of vaccines in the United States has become “daily”
As of the 20th, nearly 2.2 million Americans had completed the vaccination (i.e., the second shot) and less than 1% of the U.S. population, according to CDC statistics.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said that the state is vaccinated with about 65,000 doses a day, and at this rate of vaccination, there will be no vaccine after two or three days.
“The day-to-day day of the future is that the supply of vaccines will be exhausted every week, and then wait for next week’s rationing to arrive before starting vaccination,” Cuomo said.
“At this rate, it will take seven and a half months to get the vaccine for those who are now eligible for vaccination.”
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said on the 15th that although the city is improving its vaccination capacity, the city’s weekly vaccine supply is still “insignificant” and only “100,000 doses”, which means that the vaccine will run out in the coming week.
New York is not the only one who is angry with the federal vaccine distribution plan of the United States.
Oregon Governor Kate Brown tweeted on the 15th local time to blame the federal government for not truthfully announcing the real stock of vaccines, and that the state could not get more vaccines from the federal government, which affected the state’s vaccination progress.
Brown criticized: “This is a national fraud. The elderly in Oregon, teachers, and all of us are relying on the federal vaccine storage system’s commitment to our vaccine distribution.”
However, the fight against the pandemic is one of the most important issues of the Biden administration at present.
After Biden took office, he not only launched a “100-day mask challenge” for the American people, but also created a new position as coordinator of the coronavirus response to be responsible for the distribution of vaccines and medical equipment.
In addition, Biden actively returned to the WHO and sent Dr. Anthony Fauci to participate in the meetings of the WHO Executive Committee.
However, the latest news from CNN on the 21st local time said that Biden took over the vaccine distribution plan left by the Trump administration, in fact taking over a lonely one.
“There’s nothing to fix, we’ve had to start from scratch,” a source told CNN. Another source also said that the Biden administration clearly had to start from scratch because there was no plan at all.
According to statistics from Johns Hopkins University, 178,000 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 were added in the United States on the 20th, with a total of more than 24.43 million people infected and more than 400,000 people died of the novel coronavirus.
