In the past 10 days, new daily COVID-19 case counts both nationally and in individual states have continued to climb, setting new records and leading at least one expert to suggest the activity now places America in its second wave of virus activity, according to a staff-written report from the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota.
"We're going to hit 60,000 cases this week for certain. So we're back to 700,000 infections a day," said Scott Gottlieb, MD, former Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner, meaning that, because of low rates of testing in the United States, he estimates that only about one of 12 coronavirus infections is being identified. "This has a long way to go. For all intents and purposes, we are now in the second wave."
Gottlieb said these numbers mirror what was seen during the pandemic’s first peak in New York in April. But Gottlieb warned that, unlike the April peak, the current crest of infections has several major epicenters across the country: Florida, Texas's major cities, California, and Arizona. Currently, the United States has almost 3,000,000 COVID-19 cases, including over 130,000 deaths, according to the tracker maintained by Johns Hopkins University.
In California, which, unlike Florida and Arizona, was quick to enact physical distancing measures and slow to loosen them, officials reported 11,700 new cases within 24 hours—the biggest one-day jump reported in the United States so far during the pandemic. According to CNN, California, New York, and Florida are the only states to have ever recorded daily case totals above 10,000.
At least 32 states have reported increasing case counts, while 14 are holding steady. CNN said case counts are dropping in only four states: Connecticut, Kentucky, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire.
