By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Donald Trump has now conceded that wearing mask in public is vital to stopping the spread of coronavirus, after rejecting it for months, during which the United States has recorded 145,268 deaths from the pandemic, the highest in the world.
Live updates by worldometers.info show that America currently has 4,046,316 cases, also the highest in the world.
And CNN reports the country is on track to hit one million new cases in two weeks because it is heading in the wrong direction with Covid-19 numbers, and it is doing so with astonishing speed.
Just after 1,000 people died in a single day, the U.S. is about to reach four million Covid-19 cases.
To put that in perspective, the first reported case came on January 21. After 99 days, 1 million Americans became infected, CNN recalls.
It took just 43 days after that to reach 2 million cases.
And 28 days later, on July 8, the U.S. reached 3 million cases. Case number 4 million could be reported just two weeks after that.
As of Wednesday morning, more than 3.9 million people had been infected across the US, and more than 142,000 have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
Some states are reporting record-breaking numbers of new cases. More governors are requiring masks, and dozens of hospitals are out of ICU beds.
And the surge in new cases has greatly outpaced the increase in testing. New data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also show infections could be more than 10 times higher than the number of reported cases in some parts of the US.
May get worse before it gets better
Trump himself has warned the pandemic may “get worse before it gets better”, as he revived his virus briefings with a more scripted tone, reports the BBC.
Trump also asked all Americans to wear face coverings, saying “they’ll have an effect” and show “patriotism”.
The president, who was not wearing a mask at the briefing, has previously disparaged them as unsanitary.
His aides have reportedly pressed him to adopt a more measured approach as virus caseloads spike across the U.S.
According to the BBC, the daily White House news conferences ended soon after Trump suggested in April during freewheeling remarks from the podium that the virus might be treated by injecting disinfectant into people.
In his first White House coronavirus briefing for months on Tuesday, a less off-the-cuff president echoed what public health officials on his pandemic task force have been saying as he warned: “It will probably unfortunately get worse before it gets better.
“Something I don’t like saying about things, but that’s the way it is. We’re asking everybody that when you are not able to socially distance, wear a mask, get a mask.
“Whether you like the mask or not, they have an impact, they’ll have an effect and we need everything we can get.”
Trump – who more than once referred to Covid-19 as the “China virus” – took a mask from his pocket in the briefing room, but did not put it on.
He is facing an uphill climb to re-election in November against Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, according to opinion polls.
Biden has accused Trump of having failed Americans in his handling of the pandemic. “He’s quit on you, he’s quit on this country,” the former vice-president said.
Sinking public support for Trump
The BBC says regardless of what Trump said during his brief appearance on Tuesday, the simple fact of its return speaks volumes about the dismal course the pandemic has taken in the U.S. in the past three months.
Cases are rising, particularly in the south and west, perhaps most directly as a result of the administration’s support for states to end mitigation measures before public-health benchmarks were met.
And so Trump, sticking closely to his prepared remarks, sombrely noted that things “will probably get worse before they get better”.
After previously dismissing a mask-wearing reporter as being “politically correct”, he now encouraged people to wear face coverings.
A number of recent polls have indicated that sinking public support for Trump’s handling of the virus has been dragging down his re-election prospects.
The White House reportedly hopes getting him back in front of the American people will help rebuild their confidence in his leadership.
A real solution to his dilemma, however, won’t come until coronavirus cases once again go down, the hospitals empty, Americans go back to work, schools reopen and life returns to some semblance of normal.
That day still seems a long way off, while election day is drawing close, the BBC says.
Backtracking on mask wearing
Trump appeared without the medical experts who used to address the briefings. He kept his remarks brief and focused, avoiding sparring with reporters who asked a few questions.
“We’re asking Americans to use masks, socially distance and employ vigorous hygiene – wash your hands every chance you get, while sheltering high risk populations.
“We are imploring young Americans to avoid packed bars and other crowded indoor gatherings. Be safe and be smart,” Trump said.
He has been reluctant to wear a mask himself in front of the media, claiming that some people only wore such face coverings as a political statement against him. The press pictured him recently wearing a mask for the first time as he visited a military hospital.
When asked on Tuesday about his shifting support for masks, Trump pointed out that even health experts had changed their minds.
Back in March, both Dr Anthony Fauci, one of the leading members of the president’s coronavirus task force, and U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams said there was no reason people in the U.S. should wear a mask.
But since at least April, the US Centers for Disease Control has recommended Americans wear face coverings in public.
Fauci now argues U.S. authorities should be more “forceful” in compelling mask wearing, though Trump has rejected calls for the White House to issue a national order on the issue.
During the briefing, Trump continued to assert the virus would one day “disappear”. He also wrongly claimed the U.S. has a lower coronavirus death rate than “almost everywhere else in the world”.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. mortality rate is ranked 10th out of the 20 worst-hit countries.
By Tuesday, the U.S. had recorded nearly 3.9 million Covid-19 cases and over 141,000 deaths – the highest by volume in the world.
