U.S. authorities are ramping up their response to an jump in COVID-19 cases in the country, predominantly from two major clusters in Washington and New York.
A total of 99 cases of the coronavirus have been confirmed in the United States, according to the latest count by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which tracks the spread of the virus. In all, 13 states have reported cases and at least 11 people have been confirmed to have died, as of this writing.
On March 5, a bill aimed at fighting the new coronavirus—which would provide $8.3 billion in funding—passed the Senate in a 96-1 vote. A day earlier, it passed the House in a 415-2 vote just hours after the House and Senate appropriations leaders, Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), unveiled the plan.
The legislation includes around $3 billion in vaccine research and some $2.2 billion in prevention and preparedness efforts, greatly exceeding a proposal put forward by the White House last week. President Donald Trump told reporters that he wasn’t opposed to a larger spending package.
The spending package also includes $500 million to expand access to health services to seniors, who are considered the most at-risk group during the COVID-19 outbreak. Most of the virus deaths around the world are among older people and individuals who already have underlying health problems.
On March 5, Nevada’s first patient tested positive for the COVID-19 coronavirus, according to health officials, while five other states—Oregon, California, Rhode Island, Florida, and New York—reported their first cases of the virus in the past week.
Washington authorities on March 5 reported a sharp uptick in patients with the virus, as the state’s Department of Health secretary, John Wiesman, confirmed a total of 70 cases in the state. A day earlier there were 39 confirmed cases.
The bulk of the cases in Washington state took place in King County, where local authorities recently declared a state of emergency after it was determined there was a likely outbreak at a Life Care Center nursing home, which has been linked to most of the cases.
Fifty-one cases and eight deaths have been confirmed in King County while 18 cases and two deaths have been confirmed in nearby Snohomish County. One case was confirmed in Grant County. Many of cases and deaths reported in Washington have been of older adults, most who had underlying health conditions, according to local authorities.
On March 4, a patient in California died from the new coronavirus, marking the first death from the virus in the United States outside the state of Washington.
Meanwhile in New York a cluster of coronavirus cases produced eight additional patients, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced on March 5. Two new cases were reported in New York City and one on Long Island. In total, the number of cases doubled in the state in just hours to a total of 22.
“The number will continue to go up,” Cuomo said at a press conference. “It must because we are continuing to test more and more. The more you test the higher number you will have.”
The cluster in New York centers around a lawyer who lives in Westchester County but works in the borough of Manhattan. Nine cases had previously been linked to the 50-year-old man, including his 20-year-old son, his 14-year-old daughter, and his wife.
Researchers have also begun recruiting people in the United States to test an experimental vaccine for the coronavirus. Members of the administration have said that the risk of contracting the disease still remains low. The coronavirus outbreak emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December.
All but five states are now testing for the new coronavirus as two large commercial laboratories announced plans to test for the new virus, adding to the national capacity as the number of cases continues to rise.
Sixty-seven public health laboratories across the country are offering testing for the new virus, up from just eight a week ago, Association of Public Health Laboratories CEO Scott Becker said on Thursday. At least one lab in 44 states have successfully verified test kits and are offering diagnostic testing for COVID-19, the disease the virus causes, according to the association, which represents state and local labs across the country.
Maine, Ohio, West Virginia, Alabama, Oklahoma, Wyoming, the territory of Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico are still working on getting tests up and running.
Zachary Stieber and Jack Phillips contributed to this report
From The Epoch Times
