U.S. coronavirus deaths surpass Vietnam War toll as Florida governor meets Trump

By Jeff Mason and Maria Caspani

 

Boston EMS medics work to resuscitate a patient on the way to the ambulance amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Boston, Massachusetts, U.S., April 27, 2020. REUTERS/Brian Snyder

 

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. coronavirus death toll reached a grim milestone on Tuesday, surpassing the number of American lives lost in the Vietnam War, as Florida's governor met with President Donald Trump to discuss easing shutdowns aimed at curbing the pandemic.

 

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is weighing whether to join other states moving to relax workplace restrictions and stay-at-home orders that have battered the U.S. economy even though health experts credit the measures with slowing the contagion.

 

The meeting at the White House came as Florida announced its highest single-day death toll from the coronavirus and two days before Florida's stay-at-home order is due to expire.

 

Despite a high proportion of elderly residents, who are especially vulnerable to the virus, and having waited until early April to lock down its economy, Florida has averted the worst of the health crisis seen in other states such as New York and New Jersey.

 

"I mean, you go from D.C., Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois - you name it - Florida's done better," DeSantis said during his meeting with Trump, a fellow Republican.

 

"And I'm not criticizing those states, but everyone in the media was saying Florida was going to be like New York or Italy, and that has not happened because we understood we have a big, diverse state," DeSantis added, touting "a tailored and measured approach" that "did less damage to our state going forward."

 

About a dozen states were forging ahead to restart shuttered commerce without being ready to put in place the large-scale virus testing or means to trace close contacts of newly infected individuals, as outlined in White House guidelines on April 16.

 

Public health experts have warned that a premature rollback of social-distancing policies could trigger a resurgence of infections just when those restrictions are showing signs of bringing the outbreak under control.

 

While DeSantis' state has so far been spared the worst of the pandemic, Florida reported a record 83 new deaths and more than 700 new infections from the previous 24 hours on Tuesday. The state has so far tallied 32,846 cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, including 1,171 deaths.

 

"Apparently Trump and DeSantis find it appropriate to slap each other on the back while Floridians struggle to stay safe during this pandemic and navigate a broken unemployment system," Florida Democratic Party Chair Terrie Rizzo said.

 

The number of Americans seeking jobless benefits over the past five weeks has soared to 26.5 million - nearly one in six U.S. workers - and the Trump administration has forecast an April unemployment rate exceeding 16%.

 

DEADLIER THAN WAR

The human toll has likewise been staggering. As of Tuesday, 58,233 have died of COVID-19 in the United States, according to a Reuters tally, eclipsing in 12 weeks the total number of Americans killed during 16 years of U.S. military involvement in Vietnam. U.S. coronavirus deaths have averaged about 2,000 a day this month.

 

The number of known U.S. coronavirus infections has doubled over the past 18 days to more than 1 million. The actual count is believed to be higher, with state public health officials cautioning that shortages of trained workers and materials have limited testing capacity, leaving many infections unrecorded.

 

As further evidence that caution may still be in order, an influential University of Washington research model often cited by White House officials and public health officials revised its projected U.S. coronavirus death toll upwards on Tuesday to more than 74,000 by Aug. 4, against its previous forecast of 67,000.

 

The model showed that while most states appeared to have reached the crest of the pandemic, seven others including Mississippi, Texas, Utah and Hawaii, may be just peaking now or in the coming weeks.

 

About 30% of American cases have occurred in New York state, the epicenter of the U.S. outbreak, followed by New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, California, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

 

In California, Governor Gavin Newsom said curbside retail, manufacturing and other "lower-risk workplaces" should reopen within weeks as testing and contact-tracing improve.

 

He also said California's public education system could welcome students back as early as July to make up for a "learning loss" during school closures and to allow parents in the broader workforce to return to work.

 

Texas Governor Greg Abbott said on Monday he will allow his stay-at-home order to expire on Thursday and start a phased exit from social distancing.

 

The virus was first reported late last year in China. The earliest-known U.S. deaths came in February on the West Coast.

 

(Reporting by Doina Chiacu, Jeff Mason and Susan Heavey in Washington and Maria Caspani in New York; Additional reporting by Lisa Shumaker, Peter Szekely, Jessica Resnick-Ault, Rich McKay and Brendan O'Brien; Writing by Will Dunham and Steve Gorman; Editing by Howard Goller, Bill Tarrant and Sonya Hepinstall)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-04-29

 

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3 minutes ago, webfact said:

The U.S. coronavirus death toll reached a grim milestone on Tuesday, surpassing the number of American lives lost in the Vietnam War,

Am I reading too much into this - is there some underlying point being made here: By comparing it to the Vietnam War, they are saying it's more lives lost due to the Chinese again?

It will be 60,000 deaths tomorrow and at this rate a total of 100,000 deaths by the end of May, if not earlier.

 

I'm not sure you can call this 'so much winning'.

 

#MAGA

Just now, bluesofa said:

Am I reading too much into this - is there some underlying point being made here: By comparing it to the Vietnam War, they are saying it's more lives lost due to the Chinese again?

I dunno, is it the Chinese making a total balls up of US health policy as well?

Oh good grief this headline ????

 

 

5 minutes ago, bluesofa said:

Am I reading too much into this - is there some underlying point being made here: By comparing it to the Vietnam War, they are saying it's more lives lost due to the Chinese again?

the vietcong north were supported more so by the Russians; which was both in materiel, and 'actively' as Mig pilots.

 

It was back in the Korea era, that the Chinese were the dabblers; that tipped the scales

Vietnam 18-20 year olds were dying. 

 

Not everyone will like to admit this, but deaths are not all equal. 

2 minutes ago, sucit said:

Vietnam 18-20 year olds were dying. 

Not everyone will like to admit this, but deaths are not all equal. 

As Covid is apparently more risky for older people, isn't it more likely to be affecting those who survived the war?

How long has it been since the first death in the USA?3 months or there abouts?stop with the divisive bs it is what it is we need all of us to pull together to manage this till a vaccine and or a viable treatment is found profoundly saddening stay safe everyone stay healthy

We’ll come back to the death toll in Florida in a couple of weeks.

Off topic troll post removed also reply

Kind of peculiar that those in US government who were so bent out of shape about 4 Americans who died in Libya they spent millions of $$ and years of investigation are not responding to claims by the likes of Fox News that "these people were going to die anyway."

If, at their mother's funeral, someone said "she was going to die anyway," how would they take it?  Sick-minded reasoning.  And what for?

 

 

5 hours ago, bluesofa said:

Am I reading too much into this - is there some underlying point being made here: By comparing it to the Vietnam War, they are saying it's more lives lost due to the Chinese again?

The Vietnamese took ten years and three presidents to account for fifty eight thousand dead (that includes friendly fire fatalities), the Wuhan virus accounted for that many fatalities in four months and one president. Not hard to see who the most prolific killers are!

6 hours ago, samran said:

It will be 60,000 deaths tomorrow and at this rate a total of 100,000 deaths by the end of May, if not earlier.

 

I'm not sure you can call this 'so much winning'.

 

#MAGA

Didn’t Trump say just last week there would be a total of 60,000 deaths, maybe 65,000 tops? 

An increase of other deaths has been observed recently, in particular due to pneumonia and influenza, that have not been yet attributed to Covid-19. The number of deaths caused by Covid-19 may well be higher than the current official count.

 

"Using data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the team found about 15,000 excess deaths from March 1 to April 4. During the same time, states reported 8,000 deaths from Covid-19. "That is close to double," Dan Weinberger, who studies the epidemiology of infectious diseases at Yale, told CNN."

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/27/health/deaths-spike-covid-spread/index.html

CDC USA 60,000 died yearly from the common flu where were the news ... MSM and CCP  same team 

27 minutes ago, Siamjim said:

CDC USA 60,000 died yearly from the common flu where were the news ... MSM and CCP  same team 

Here, for example.

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/01/30/health/flu-deadly-virus-15-million-infected-trnd/index.html

 

You will also notice that the number of death for the full 2019-2020 season (24,000), is much lower than the number of death from Covid-19 at the beginning of the epidemic season. Despite the fact that there has been no shutdown during most of the flu season.

https://www.advisory.com/daily-briefing/2020/04/28/flu-update

 

Edited April 29, 20206 yr by candide

But ... see it from another way: it clears up a lot of medical care costing old ones, make space available in elderly care homes, bring inheritages closer, makes pensions and retirements costs a lot cheaper, less obligations to visit the senile old ones for the busy, busy, busy youngsters, and geriatric care helpers available for other medical duties.

In a country like the USA, where health and medical care are only available for who can afford it, it cleans also up a lot of poor people ( especially ni..ers, sorry for usign this word) , immigrants ( all crooks and drugs smugglers acc to Mr Whise Guy), and brings in a LOT of money to the rich, who owns the hospitals, medical care facilities + factories etc. 

More cynical we cannot make it.

Edited April 29, 20206 yr by puipuitom

If these people get it wrong and downplay any real risks that exist to the people they’re not gunna be very popular if things go south. 

9 hours ago, bluesofa said:

As Covid is apparently more risky for older people, isn't it more likely to be affecting those who survived the war?

If you had to die, would you rather it happen at 18, or at 75?

10 hours ago, samran said:

It will be 60,000 deaths tomorrow and at this rate a total of 100,000 deaths by the end of May, if not earlier.

 

I'm not sure you can call this 'so much winning'.

 

#MAGA

To attribute the 60,000 deaths to Trump is simply breathtaking in it's distortion of reality.  To politicize the pandemic is sick.

15 minutes ago, Mick501 said:

9 hours ago, bluesofa said:

As Covid is apparently more risky for older people, isn't it more likely to be affecting those who survived the war?

If you had to die, would you rather it happen at 18, or at 75?

The point that I was making was the same group that were at risk this time were those who that survived the war, irrelevant of what age you might choose to die.

It's hard to even remotely conceive of how the U.S. federal government response to the pandemic, from its very origins until now, could have been any worse than it's actually been under demagogue Trump and his medical quackery, inept bumbling appointees, boastful promises that never even came close to reality, and incessant partisanship at a time when a real president should have been working to unite the country and bring everyone together.

 

https://www.health.com/condition/cold-flu-sinus/how-many-people-die-of-the-flu-every-year

35 minutes ago, Mick501 said:

If you had to die, would you rather it happen at 18, or at 75?

Have you asked the dead ones.

15 minutes ago, bluesofa said:

The point that I was making was the same group that were at risk this time were those who that survived the war, irrelevant of what age you might choose to die.

The point you are making is not a very good one.

 

The point he made is a good one. 

 

Quote

 

If US is unprepared for a second wave of coronavirus, Fauci warns country could be in for 'a bad fall and a bad winter'

A second round of the coronavirus is 'inevitable,' the nation's leading epidemiologist says, but just how bad it is will depend on the progress the US makes in the coming months.

...

So far, more than 1 million Americans have been infected and at least 58,355 have died. A leading model predicts more than 72,000 people will die in the US by early August.

...

 

 

 

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/29/health/us-coronavirus-wednesday/index.html

 

Meanwhile...

 

Quote

 

Trump defends wildly inaccurate prediction

In the East Room event, CNN's Jim Acosta asked Trump about his wildly incorrect prediction from February that the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States would soon reach zero.
 

For context, here's what Trump said in February: "When you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that's a pretty good job we've done."
 

On Tuesday, Acosta invoked Trump's faulty prediction from February while asking for his reaction to the news that the United States officially surpassed 1 million confirmed cases.

 

 

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/28/politics/fact-check-trump-remarks-april-28/index.html

Edited April 29, 20206 yr by metisdead
Edited as per fair use policy.

from Johns Hopkins daily CV report for April 28 -- U.S. sets new U.S. record for daily CV deaths:

 

Quote

 

The US CDC reported 957,875 total cases (29,256 new; 4,999 probable) and 53,922 deaths (3,483 new; 6,142 probable) as of April 26. This appears to be a new record high for daily reported deaths (excluding the day New York City first reported probable COVID-19 deaths [April 14]), exceeding the previous high by more than 650 (23.6%).

 

Notably, the United States represents a third of the global cases and more than a quarter of the global deaths. 

 

 

https://myemail.constantcontact.com/COVID-19-Updates---April-28.html?soid=1107826135286&aid=F0EGiiWovNw

 

Edited April 29, 20206 yr by metisdead
Edited as per fair use policy.

1 hour ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

It's hard to even remotely conceive of how the U.S. federal government response to the pandemic, from its very origins until now, could have been any worse than it's actually been under demagogue Trump and his medical quackery, inept bumbling appointees, boastful promises that never even came close to reality, and incessant partisanship at a time when a real president should have been working to unite the country and bring everyone together.

I see you snipped my entire post above that statement so you could ignore the substance of the post and the facts noted so you could get in your little rant. 
 

 

 

The democrats were praying for a miracle to defeat Trump, guess they got it. Beware of what you wish for.