The White House announced on Thursday that the number of COVID-19 related deaths in the United States has crossed the one million mark. While the situation has improved in the recent past, the cases are once again on the rise and a number of states are looking to introduce new regulations.
“Today, we mark a tragic milestone: one million American lives lost to Covid,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. Biden also asked the citizens to “remain vigilant against this pandemic” and urged the Congress to increase funding for resources like vaccines, testing and vaccines.
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The cases are on the rise once again around the world but the United States has lifted a number of restrictions. In the last few weeks, the cases have gone up once again due to the Omicron subvariant and with the mask mandate no longer in practice, the rise in cases is extremely worrying.
“I think we are in a place where psychologically and socially and economically, people are largely done with the pandemic,” said Celine Gounder, an infectious disease expert at New York University.
“(But) the pandemic is not over. So, you have a disconnect between what is happening epidemiologically and what’s happening in terms of how people are responding,” she told AFP.
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In related news, the death toll in Europe has passed two million, according to World Health Organization (WHO). According to the official data, 2,002,058 people have died from COVID-19.
“A devastating milestone has passed as reported confirmed Covid-19 deaths from countries in the WHO European Region have exceeded more than 2 million people,” WHO said in their statement.
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(With agency inputs)
