Six U.S. states see record COVID-19 deaths, Vietnam warns capital to brace for new outbreak

111

A half-dozen U.S. states in the South and West reported one-day records for coronavirus deaths on Tuesday and cases in Texas passed the 400,000 mark as California health officials said Latinos made up more than half its cases.

Arkansas, California, Florida, Montana, Oregon and Texas each reported record spikes in fatalities.

In the United States more than 1,300 lives were lost nation wide on Tuesday, the biggest one-day increase since May, according to a Reuters tally.

California health officials said Latinos, who make up just over a third of the most populous U.S. state, account for 56% of COVID-19 infections and 46% of deaths. Cases are soaring in the Central Valley agricultural region, with its heavily Latino population, overwhelming hospitals. The state on Tuesday reported 171 deaths.

Florida saw 191 coronavirus deaths in the prior 24 hours, the state health department said.

Texas added more than 6,000 new cases on Monday, pushing its total to 401,477, according to a Reuters tally. Only three other states – California, Florida and New York – have more than 400,000 total cases. The four are the most populous U.S. states.

California and Texas both reported decreases in overall hospitalizations as Dr. Anthony Fauci, a top U.S. infectious diseases expert, saw signs the surge could be peaking in the South and West while other areas were on the cusp of new outbreaks.

Fauci said early indications showed the percentage of positive coronavirus tests rising in Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee and Kentucky.

TEACHERS’ UNION FIGHTS

The rise in U.S. deaths and infections has dampened early hopes the country was past the worst of an economic crisis that has decimated businesses and put millions of Americans out of work.

The trend has fueled a bitter debate over the reopening of schools in the coming weeks. President Donald Trump and members of his administration have pushed for students to return to class, while some teachers and local officials have called for online learning.

“We will fight on all fronts for the safety of students and their educators,” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said during the union’s virtual convention on Tuesday. “It’s the 11th hour; we need the resources now.”

The Texas Education Agency, the state’s overseer of public education, said it would deny funding to schools that delay in-person classes because of orders by local health authorities related to the pandemic.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton issued guidance that health authorities cannot impose “blanket” school closures for coronavirus prevention. Any such decision is up to school officials, he said.

Local health leaders in the biggest metropolitan areas in Texas, including Houston and Dallas, have recently ordered the postponement of in-person classes.

In Washington, some Republicans in the U.S. Senate pushed back against their own party’s $1 trillion coronavirus relief proposal the day after it was unveiled by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, weighing on U.S. stocks.

“I’m not for borrowing another trillion dollars,” Republican Senator Rand Paul told reporters.

Democrats have rejected the plan as too limited compared with their $3 trillion proposal that passed the House of Representatives in May. Some Republicans called it too expensive.

Trump said on Tuesday he did not support everything in the Senate Republican coronavirus relief legislation but would not elaborate.

“There are also things that I very much support,” he told a White House briefing. “But we’ll be negotiating.”

Trump also groused about Fauci’s high approval ratings and joked “nobody likes me” as he struggles to improve his standing with voters over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

“It can only be my personality,” said Trump.

Vietnam, virus-free for months, was bracing for another wave of COVID-19 infections on Wednesday after local media reported a case in the capital, Hanoi, linked to a recent outbreak in the central city of Danang.

Hanoi should prepare medical equipment and materials for another “fight against COVID-19”, the Southeast Asian country’s government said in a statement, which made no mention of the case reported in media.

Thanks to a centralised quarantine programme and an aggressive contact-tracing system, Vietnam had managed to keep its coronavirus tally to just 446 cases, despite sharing a long and porous border with China.

Vietnam, with over 95 million people, is the most populous country in the world to have recorded no deaths from the virus.

That record is now under threat following an outbreak last weekend in Danang, where tens of thousands of local tourists had been taking advantage of heavily discounted travel deals designed to support the country’s virus-hit tourism industry.

The government on Tuesday suspended all flights to and from Danang for 15 days. At least 30 cases of the novel coronavirus have been detected in or around the city.

About 18,000 tourists who had been in Danang have returned to the southern business hub Ho Chi Minh City, authorities said on Tuesday.

The Hanoi authorities had earlier said they were expecting 15,000 to 20,000 to return for Danang.

A staff member at a Hanoi pizza restaurant who recently returned from Danang had tested positive for the coronavirus, state media reported on Wednesday, adding that authorities had closed the restaurant for disinfection.

The health ministry has yet to confirm a new Hanoi case.

Vietnam will repatriate 120 construction workers infected with COVID-19 from Equatorial Guinea on Wednesday, according to state media. The stricken workers will be treated at a hospital outside Hanoi.

REUTERS