The world has entered a “new and dangerous phase” of the coronavirus pandemic, a top official from the World Health Organisation said on Friday, a stark warning that came as the US struggled to control spiralling outbreaks and as business leaders signalled growing unease with the country’s ability to effectively contend with the virus.
Coronavirus cases spiked sharply across the American South and West, particularly in states that loosened restrictions on businesses several weeks ago.
In Florida, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Arizona, daily counts of new coronavirus cases reached their highest levels of the pandemic this week. Texas, which has seen known cases double in the past month, became the sixth state to surpass 100,000 cases, according to a New York Times database of cases in the US.
Around the country, there were indications that major companies and sports teams were changing their own plans as the new surges emerged.
Apple said it was temporarily closing 11 retail stores across four states amid an uptick in cases. AMC Entertainment reversed course on its mask policy on Friday, saying it will now require patrons to wear face coverings when movie theatres reopen next month.
Two Major League Baseball clubs, the Philadelphia Phillies and the Toronto Blue Jays, and a professional hockey team, the Tampa Bay Lightning, abruptly shut down training facilities in Florida over concerns that the virus was threatening players’ safety.
Across the globe, the outlook for containing the coronavirus worsened. A pandemic that had been defined early on by a series of shifting epicentres — including Wuhan, China; Iran; northern Italy; Spain; and New York — was now distinguished by a wide and expanding scope. Eighty-one nations have seen a growth in new cases over the past two weeks. Only 36 have seen declines.
“Many people are understandably fed up with being at home,” Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the WHO, said in a news conference in which he described the new phase of the virus. “Countries are understandably eager to open up their societies and their economies. But the virus is still spreading fast. It is still deadly and most people are still susceptible.”
A sobering lesson in the virus’s tenacity came in China, where officials had recently proclaimed that they had vanquished the virus — only to see it surge back in Beijing, the capital. That metropolis, of 21 million people, is facing new restrictions on travel and renewed school closures. Seoul, South Korea, also reported a new surge in cases.
For weeks, the US has been slowly but determinedly returning to its pre-pandemic existence amid economic turmoil. Businesses reopened, summer camps started and workers returned to stores. But efforts to boost the economy by bringing more people back to work may be happening too soon, experts said.
New York Times News Service