US coronavirus death toll rises above 400,000 in Trump’s last hours

BALTIMORE (AP) The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus has skyrocketed by 400,000 in the declining office hours for President Donald Trump on Tuesday, whose handling of the crisis by public health experts is an exceptional failure.

The current total of lost lives, as compiled by Johns Hopkins University, is almost equal to the number of Americans killed in World War II. It’s about the people of Tulsa, Oklahoma; Tampa, Florida; of New Orleans. It is equivalent to the sea of ​​humanity that was in Woodstock in 1969.

That’s just under the estimated 409,000 Americans who died in 2019 from strokes, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, flu and pneumonia.

And the virus is by no means finished with the US, not even with the arrival of the vaccines that could eventually overcome the outbreak. A model commonly cited by the University of Washington plans that the death toll would reach nearly 567,000 by May 1st.

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While the Trump administration is getting recognition with Operation Warp Speed, the crash program for the development and distribution of coronavirus vaccines, Trump has repeatedly underestimated the threat, mocked it, played against barriers, promoted unproven and unsafe treatments, undercut scientific experts and expressed condolences to the victims.

Even his own battle with COVID-19 apparently left him unchanged.

The White House defended the administration.

“We grieve every life lost to this pandemic, and thanks to the president’s leadership, Operation Warp Speed ​​has led to the development of several safe and effective vaccines in record time, something many have said will never happen,” he said. said White House spokeswoman Judd Deere. .

Elected President Joe Biden takes office on Wednesday.

The country has reached the 400,000 milestone in just under a year. The first known deaths due to the virus in the US were in early February 2020, both in Santa Clara County, California.

While the score is based on figures provided by government agencies around the world, the actual death toll is believed to be significantly higher, in part due to inadequate testing and cases that were early inaccurately attributed to other causes.

It took four months to reach the first 100,000 dead. It took just over a month to go from 300,000 to 400,000.