U.S. prepares for worst four months of the pandemic as it stares down the ‘darkest’ days yet

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Thu, 2020-11-12 14:41 — mike kraft

U.S. prepares for worst four months of the pandemic as it stares down the 'darkest' days yet The U.S. is heading for a “dark winter,” a “Covid hell" that will make the next few months of the coronavirus pandemic unlike anything the nation has seen yet. Will Feuer CNBC

Epidemiologists, scientists and public health officials are warning that the United States has yet to see the most difficult days of the coronavirus outbreak.
“We have not even come close to the peak, and as such, our hospitals are now being overrun,” said Dr. Michael Osterholm, a member of President-elect Joe Biden’s Covid task force.
The upcoming holidays set the country up for a lethal winter and spring since hospitalizations and deaths lag newly diagnosed infections by a few weeks.

... Even as drug manufacturers make progress on a vaccine and treatments, epidemiologists, scientists and public health officials are warning that the United States has yet to see the most difficult days of the outbreak. Those are projected to come over the next three to four months.

“What America has to understand is that we are about to enter Covid hell,” Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center of Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said in an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Alley” on Monday, hours after Pfizer announced promising news about its vaccine. “It is happening.”

The U.S. is now reporting an average of more than 120,000 new Covid-19 cases a day — a staggering number that sets a deadly tone heading into the holiday season, medical experts say. The sheer volume of new cases cannot be explained by increased testing alone, because daily new cases are outpacing the rise in testing, health officials acknowledge.

Cases are also rising at a faster pace, with a roughly 33% jump in the seven-day average over the past week, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The number of people currently hospitalized across the U.S. also stands at record 61,964, according to the COVID Tracking Project, which is run by journalists at The Atlantic...

Also see AP Roundup: Virus surge engulfs US with millions of new cases

Also see NBC: As Covid hospitalizations soar, states struggle to find enough beds and staff

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