March 8 (Reuters) – The United States reported a 12% decrease in new cases of COVID-19 last week, while vaccinations accelerated to a record 2.2 million shots per day, according to a Reuters analysis of state, county and CDC data.
New infections dropped for eight weeks in a row and an average of 60,000 new cases per day for the week ended March 7th. COVID-19 deaths fell 18% last week to 11,800, the lowest since late November and averaging 1,686 a day.
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Despite the positive trends, health officials warned that the country could see a surge in cases as more infectious variants of the virus were found in almost every state.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top U.S. expert in infectious diseases, urged the country to keep most pandemic restrictions in place until new cases drop to less than 10,000 a day.
Thirteen out of the 50 states reported more new infections last week compared to the previous seven days, coming from 29 states in the previous week, according to the Reuters analysis. New Jersey, New York and Rhode Island had the most infections per 100,000 inhabitants.
According to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, as of Sunday, 18% of the U.S. population had received at least one dose of vaccine and 9% had received two doses.
The country fired an average of 2.2 million shots a day last week, up from 1.6 million shots in the previous week.
The average number of COVID-19 patients in U.S. hospitals dropped 16% last week to 44,000, the lowest since late October, according to a Reuters report.
In the United States, more than 525,000 people died from the virus, or one in every 621 residents.
(Graphics by Chris Canipe, written by Lisa Shumaker, edited by Tiffany Wu)