The United States implemented wider coronavirus testing across the country on Wednesday, leading up to a massive jump in new cases. Experts said the spike in new CoVID-19 cases is not a surprise.
California Orders 40 Million Residents to Stay Home
California's Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered an estimated 40 million of residents in the state to stay at home if they don't have important things to do outside for the next few weeks as the coronavirus outbreak in the United States heightens.
According to the New York Times, the order is the most drastic move yet that any governor has done in the country since the CoVID-19 crisis began.
Newsom presented a model that state planners came up with in his order. In the said model, it was projected that up to 25 million or more Californians could get infected with the novel virus within two months.
The news came after over 2,700 new coronavirus cases in the country were recorded on Thursday.
Over 13,000 Total Cases Across U.S.
As of Thursday evening, the U.S. recorded over 14,000 confirmed CoVID-19 cases, CNN reported.
The spike in new cases came as health professionals ramped up testing across different states. Some experts said there is inadequate medical equipment available to tackle the growing number of cases and the need for more isolation facilities.
The U.S. has also recorded over 200 deaths due to the highly-infectious disease.
Here are the states that saw CoVID-19 deaths so far, as reported by Business Insider:
Washington - 74
New York - 38
California - 18
Georgia - 10
Louisiana - 10
Florida - 9
New Jersey - 9
Texas - 5
Illinois - 4
Oregon, Michigan Colorado, and Connecticut have 3 each, Virginia, Indiana, Kentucky, Vermont, and Wisconsin have 2 each, and Nevada, Kansas, South Dakota, South Carolina, Maryland, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Ohio, and Mississippi each have one.
Trump Cancels G7 In-Person Conference
G7 leaders were set to meet at Camp David in June but the White House said on Thursday that U.S. President Donald Trump decided to cancel the in-person conference. Instead, the leaders will hold their conference on video, Reuters reported exclusively.
A video conference was already held among G7 leaders earlier this week and among those agreed on was the supposed meeting in June. The conference's in-person cancelation came amid succeeding border-blocking of some countries and increasing numbers of people testing CoVID-19 positive around the world.
NIH Director Urges Drastic Moves to Contain CoVID-19
National Institutes of Health (NIH) Francis Collins said in an interview with USA Today that the coming weeks will be "a very rough road" for the United States as it grapples with the novel virus that infected over 200,000 worldwide.
When asked about whether the U.S. should impose a total lockdown at this point, Collins noted that it is difficult to provide an answer now. On the other hand, he urged the government to take the high road and grab a coronavirus action plan "that most people would find to be too drastic."
The latest figures from the World Health Organization (WHO) reveal that there are at least 209,839 confirmed CoVID-19 cases worldwide, and at least 8,778 deaths.
