The world surpassed five million registered COVID-19 cases on Thursday, another grim milestone in a global pandemic full of them. Over 30 percent of the 5.02 million cases, 1.55 million, are in the U.S., according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University. The No. 2 country is Russia, with 318,000 reported cases. Overall, 328,462 people are reported to have died from the coronavirus, including 93,439 in the U.S. The actual numbers worldwide are almost certainly significantly higher.
It is an uneven picture globally and in the U.S., with cases and deaths declining in some countries or states and rising in others. But the pandemic is not waning overall. The World Health Organization said Wednesday that member countries had reported 106,000 new cases in the past 24 hours, the highest daily total since the outbreak began. "We still have a long way to go in this pandemic," said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Today's political cartoons - December 22, 2024Cartoons Sunday's cartoons - the long and short of it, trigger finger, and more
-
5 hilariously spirited cartoons about the spirit of ChristmasCartoons Artists take on excuses, pardons, and more
-
Inside the house of AssadThe Explainer Bashar al-Assad and his father, Hafez, ruled Syria for more than half a century but how did one family achieve and maintain power?
-
California declares bird flu emergencySpeed Read The emergency came hours after the nation's first person with severe bird flu infection was hospitalized
-
Bird flu one mutuation from human threat, study findsSpeed Read A Scripps Research Institute study found one genetic tweak of the virus could enable its spread among people
-
Dark chocolate tied to lower diabetes riskSpeed Read The findings were based on the diets of about 192,000 US adults over 34 years
-
ACA opens 2025 enrollment, enters 2024 raceSpeed Read Mike Johnson promises big changes to the Affordable Care Act if Trump wins the election
-
McDonald's sued over E. coli linked to burgerSpeed Read The outbreak has sickened at least 49 people in 10 states and left one dead
-
Texas dairy worker gets bird flu from infected cowSpeed Read The virus has been spreading among cattle in Texas, Kansas, Michigan and New Mexico
-
Dengue hits the Americas hard and earlySpeed Read Puerto Rico has declared an epidemic as dengue cases surge
-
US bans final type of asbestosSpeed Read Exposure to asbestos causes about 40,000 deaths in the U.S. each year
