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Reuters

President-elect Joe Biden’s top coronavirus adviser said on Friday there were no plans for a wholesale nationwide lockdown to curb the surging pandemic, as the US set a single-day record of more than 167,000 new cases.
It was the ninth consecutive day with more than 100,000 Covid-19 cases. Coronavirus-related deaths increased to 2,141, the most since late June.
The daily caseload has more than doubled in 13 states over the past two weeks, most of them in the Midwest.
The increasingly dire situation has prompted a growing list of state and local governments to reimpose restrictions they eased during a summertime ebb in Covid-19 outbreaks.
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The governors of six states in the Northeast, the region hit hardest in the early months of the pandemic, plan an emergency meeting this weekend to coordinate responses, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said.
Three West Coast states jointly called for a halt in non-essential travel. The joint advisory from California, Oregon and Washington urging residents to avoid venturing out of state came as health experts voiced concerns that the coming holiday travel season would accelerate already alarming spikes in Covid-19 infections and hospitalisation.
Oregon Governor Kate Brown took the additional step of ordering social gatherings limited to no more than six people, effective immediately.
Several San Francisco Bay Area counties are joining San Francisco in banning all indoor dining and scaling back other activities.
The country’s patchwork of measures is likely to remain intact after Biden is inaugurated on January 20 following his election defeat of Republican Donald Trump, the head of the Democrat’s coronavirus advisory board said.


“We’re not in a place where we’re saying shut the whole country down,” Dr Vivek Murthy, a former US surgeon general, told ABC.
“Right now the way we should be thinking about this is more like a series of restrictions that we dial up or down depending on how bad a spread is taking place in a specific region,” he said.
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Murthy’s comments were a sharp rebuttal to Trump’s repeated campaign assertions that Biden was intent on locking down the country if he were elected president.
Medical experts point to increased indoor gatherings with the onset of winter, along with lapses in social distancing and mask-wearing habits, as the main factors stoking an ominous nationwide surge in coronavirus transmissions and the rate of Covid-19 tests coming back positive.
The mounting caseload is starting to strain the resources of some hospitals and is on track to push many to the brink, they warn.
“I’m 100 per cent worried about the holidays,” said Dr Khalilah Gates, a pulmonary specialist at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. “We don’t have an endless ability to surge.”

On Thursday, California became only the second state, after Texas earlier this month, to see its tally of confirmed infections to date top 1 million, with its daily average of new cases jumping nearly 50 per cent in the first week of November.
“This is the fastest rate of rise we have seen in California,” said Dr Erica Pan, the state’s acting health officer and chief epidemiologist.
Illinois reported a record 15,433 new cases on Friday, the most of any state in a 24-hour period, surpassing the previous all-time high of 15,300 set by Florida in July. Alabama on Friday added almost 3,000 new cases, its highest number in a single day since the pandemic began.
Trump loyalists hit by new coronavirus wave after election party
Dr Robert Kim-Farley, an epidemiology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, attributed some of the spikes to recent Halloween celebrations. He warned of more to come if Americans ignored advice to avoid travelling and gathering for Thanksgiving in late November and Christmas.
Chicago has urged residents to stay at home and shun visitors for the next 30 days, including Thanksgiving.
In New York City, restaurants were ordered closed to indoor dining at 10pm, while Detroit public schools suspended in-person learning.


Dr Anthony Fauci, the top US infectious disease expert serving on Trump’s coronavirus task force, said he has had no contact with Biden’s transition team, but his advice would be to continue social distancing, avoiding crowds, wearing masks and washing hands.
“Public health principles don’t change from one month to another or from one administration to another,” he said.
Fauci recommended wearing masks at Thanksgiving gatherings if the coronavirus status of others is unknown. “There is community spread right now,” he said. “[People] don’t have symptoms, they don’t know they are infected. So, we need to pull more testing into the community.”
He reassured the public that with simple public health measures, the number of infections will come down. “You add that to the help of a vaccine, we can turn this around. It is not futile.”
Additional reporting by Associated Press, Bloomberg


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United States

US sets new coronavirus record, as Biden adviser says no plans for nationwide lockdown

A woman is tested for Covid-19 at a hospital in Los Angeles. California has surpassed 1 million cases, with stricter restrictions imposed to curb the spread of the virus. Photo: Reuters

U.S. President Donald Trump listens while delivering an update on the so-called Operation Warp Speed program, the joint Defense Department and HHS initiative that has struck deals with several drugmakers in an effort to help speed up the search for effective treatments for the ongoing coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, in an address from the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, U.S., November 13, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Coronavirus: Joe Biden vows action on ‘day one’ as new US cases top 127,000

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. Photo: AP

In this Oct. 25, 2020, photo, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows responds to reporters questions outside the West Wing on the North Lawn of the White House in Washington. A multi-state coronavirus surge in the countdown to Election Day has exposed a clear split between President Donald Trump’s bullish embrace of a return to normalcy and urgent public warnings from the government’s top health officials. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Coronavirus: an American dies every 107 seconds as US tops records

A Covid-19 patient is loaded into an ambulance in Brooklyn Park, Maryland. Photo: AFP

The US has tallied almost 9 million cases of the coronavirus since the beginning of the pandemic. Photo: AFP

Science may be back when Biden is in but there’s no magic cure for coronavirus

US President-elect Joe Biden has touted the idea of a nationwide mask order, but experts say that a federal command could face legal challenges and would be difficult to enforce. Photo: Reuters

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Despite over 167,000 new daily cases, Joe Biden’s top Covid-19 adviser Vivek Murthy said restrictions should be raised or lowered depending on the spread
States are reimposing restrictions while Dr Anthony Fauci recommended wearing face masks at Thanksgiving gatherings



Despite over 167,000 new daily cases, Joe Biden’s top Covid-19 adviser Vivek Murthy said restrictions should be raised or lowered depending on the spread.
