Coronavirus: One death every 15 seconds; toll crosses 7 lakh
What's the story
Over seven months after the coronavirus outbreak first emerged, the global death toll has crossed seven lakh. The total number of cases stands at 18.5 million. Reportedly, as the outbreak continues to surge worldwide, one person dies of COVID-19 every 15 seconds on average. The United States remains the world's worst-hit country, followed by Brazil and India. Here are more details.
Details
In 17 days, world added one lakh more deaths
According to a Reuters count, on average, around 5,900 people died of COVID-19 every 24 hours. This equates to 247 people per hour, or one person every 15 seconds. Notably, it has only been 17 days since the global death toll crossed six lakh, indicating a rapid increase in the number of fatalities even months into the outbreak.
Worst-hit
US worst-hit; reported over 1.5 lakh deaths
The US has reported the highest number of cases (4.77 million) and deaths (1.56 lakh), according to the Johns Hopkins University tracker. Brazil is the second worst-hit, with 2.80 million cases and over 95,000 deaths. The third-highest death toll has been reported in Mexico, with over 48,000 fatalities. The nation has reported nearly 4.5 lakh cases, the world's sixth-highest tally.
Information
Over 19 lakh cases in India; death toll nears 40,000
As per the latest available figures, India has reported a total of 19,08,254 COVID-19 cases, the third-highest in the world. 5,86,244 of the total infections are active while 12,82,215 have recovered. The death toll is 39,795.
Worsening outbreak
Outbreak surges in Latin America
In the initial stages of the outbreak, Latin America had been spared but it's now leading the global outbreak with Mexico, Peru (4.39 lakh cases; over 20,000 deaths), Chile (3.62 lakh cases; over 9,700 deaths), and Colombia (3.34 lakh cases; over 11,300 deaths) among the 10 worst-hit countries. Due to poverty and densely-packed cities in Latin America, the outbreak has been difficult to control.
Second wave
After controlling outbreak, Australia, Japan, others, see record spikes again
Many countries that briefly appeared to have brought the outbreak under control are now seeing a rise in the number of infections again. Some of them had recently witnessed single-day records in new cases. These include Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, Bolivia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Bulgaria, Belgium, Uzbekistan, and Israel. As per the current trend of the outbreak, the fight against COVID-19 is far from over.