A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now infected more than 100.2 million people worldwide and killed over 2.1 million of them, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
Coronavirus hospitalizations continue to trend downward, but the number of new deaths reported Tuesday is still above 3,000, The COVID Tracking Project reported. There are 108,957 people currently hospitalized in the U.S. with COVID-19, which is almost 30,000 fewer cases than a couple of weeks ago, the tracking project said.
There were 3,734 deaths reported Tuesday and the seven-day average was 3,302, according to the health data.
“While cases and hospitalizations are falling, the 7-day average for deaths jumped up today. That’s because last Tuesday’s data was depressed by the holiday,” the tracking project tweeted. “We do expect, however, that deaths could stay elevated for quite a while.”
President Joe Biden’s administration said it has secured commitments from vaccine makers to buy another 200 million doses to arrive this summer — 100 million from Pfizer and 100 million from Moderna.
This raises the total to 600 million and ensures the U.S. will eventually have two shots for nearly every American.
“We expect these vaccines to be available in production over the course of the summer,” a Biden official said.
Buying more doses had always been an option for the U.S. government as part of the prior contracts.
“We will increase overall weekly vaccination distributions of states, tribes and territories from 8.6 million doses to a minimum of 10 million doses starting next week,” President Joe Biden said Tuesday.
Biden also vowed to increase “transparency with states, cities and tribes and local partners when it comes to the vaccine supply.”
“From this week forward … states, tribes and territories will now always have a reliable, three-week forecast with the supply they’re going to get,” he said.
