The United States recorded nearly 37,000 new cases of the novel coronavirus Wednesday as the virus continued to spread across southern and western states, according COVID-19 trackers.
The 36,880 new cases is up from 34,700 recorded Tuesday, and broke previous single-day record for new cases set April 24 when 36,739 were confirmed, according to a New York Times database.
While the nation had been witnessing daily declines in new virus cases, certain states have seen cases rise amid their plans to reopen. Arizona, Texas, and Florida have all reported thousands of new cases of COVID-19 every day for more than a week, according to the Times virus tracker.
Governors of different states have adopted a variety of strategies to reduce the spread of the coronavirus.
In North Carolina, where nearly 20% of the state’s approximately 56,000 total cases have been recorded in the past week, according to The New York Times, Gov. Roy Cooper temporarily paused the reopening process and mandated mask-wearing within the state.
In Texas, where nearly 32,000 cases have been confirmed in the past week and hospitalizations have doubled in the past month, Gov. Greg Abbott, urged people to wear masks and acknowledged that additional precautions may have to be taken to mitigate the virus’ toll.
Texas could have avoided a massive Covid-19 crisis if it acted rationally and proactively early on to stem the onslaught. Now Houston’s hospitals may run out of ICU beds as soon as today and Gov. Greg Abbott is frantically backtracking. Column:https://t.co/WrfdZvSKeg
— Tim O’Brien (@TimOBrien) June 25, 2020
“Surely the public can understand that if those spikes continue, additional measures are going to be necessary to make sure we maintain the health and safety of the people of the state of Texas,” Abbott said Monday.
“Wearing a mask will help keep Texas open, because not taking action to slow the spread will cause COVID to spread even worse, risking people’s lives and ultimately leading to the closure of more businesses,” he said.
President Donald Trump has attributed climbing cases to increases in testing. “When you have all those tests, you have more cases,” Trump said during his Tuesday rally in Phoenix. (RELATED: US Passes 2 Million Confirmed Coronavirus Cases As States Reopen)
While daily testing has increased throughout the pandemic, the percentage of people testing positive has increased in recent days as well, according to a Johns Hopkins University database.
In Florida and Arizona, positive tests have climbed above 15% and 20%, respectively.
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