Eastern Europe crosses over 5 million #covid-19 cases The tally of coronavirus cases in the Eastern European sub-region passed 5 million on Saturday, a Reuters tally showed, as governments across Europe take measures to try to rein in surging cases.
The region, which comprises Belarus, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Moldova, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine, has the highest count of reported covid-19 cases in Europe.
Eastern Europe reported over 82,000 cases in a single day on an average in the last week, while adding over 1,500 deaths daily on average.
Russia, Poland, and Ukraine are among the top 20 countries with the most cases in the world.
A recent surge in cases has taken Russia past the 2 million threshold, behind only the United States, India, Brazil, and France in total infections. Authorities have resisted imposing lockdowns across the country as they did earlier this year, however, preferring targeted, regional measures.
Europe has so far reported over 15 million covid cases, making it the region with the highest number of cases. It has recorded more than 346,000 deaths, the second-highest in the world by region after Latin America, according to a Reuters tally.
Volunteers Jailene Cruz and Genesis Maldonado sort food at the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank distribution center, as the global outbreak of the coronavirus disease continues, in Los Angeles, California. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson
US officials worry about holiday spike as coronavirus surges
US health authorities braced for further increases in covid-19 infections, hospitalizations and deaths on Friday, capping a week in which the spread of the novel coronavirus accelerated ahead of next week's Thanksgiving holiday.
The seven-day rolling average of new covid-19 cases reached more than 165,000 on Thursday, while the seven-day average for deaths climbed to 1,359, more than any day since late May, according to a Reuters tally of public health data.
With hospitalizations rising across much of the nation,
straining already exhausted medical staff, officials in more than 20 states have imposed restrictions to curtail the spread of the virus.
The White House Coronavirus Task Force coordinator, Dr. Deborah Birx, said the virus is spreading at a high rate across more than half the country and that Thanksgiving gatherings should be limited to immediate family members rather than a maximum number of people.
"I don't like it to be any number... if you say it can be 10, and it's eight people from four different families, then that probably is not the same degree of safe as 10 people from your immediate household," Birx told CNN on Friday.
"Hope and help are on the way"
#US #Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar has said that Pfizer is filing an application for an emergency use authorization and the FDA could approve its trial vaccine "within weeks."
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