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The United States took another grim milestone on Friday, as the confirmed number of coronavirus deaths surpassed 700,000, just over a year and a half after the start of the pandemic, and despite the widespread availability of vaccines .
The milestone, according to data from Johns Hopkins University, comes less than two weeks after the national death toll exceeded the estimated number of deaths in the United States during the 1918 influenza pandemic.
Despite national COVID-19 measures showing encouraging signs of decline, about 1,500 Americans die from the virus each day, according to federal data.
“Reaching 700,000 deaths is a tragic and completely preventable step. We had the knowledge and the tools to prevent that from happening, and unfortunately politics, lack of urgency and mistrust of science brought us here.” said John Brownstein, Ph.D., an epidemiologist at Boston Children’s Hospital and ABC News contributor.
To put it in perspective, the staggering number of deaths is higher than the number of Americans estimated to have died from cancer last year, one of the leading causes of death in the country. That’s higher than the total number of U.S. soldiers killed in action in the country’s recent history, and it’s about the same as the population of Boston, Massachusetts.
Some experts believe the current death toll from COVID-19 may already be vastly underestimated, due to inconsistent reporting by states and localities, and the exclusion of excess deaths, a measure of the number of lives lost beyond what would be expected if the pandemic had not occurred.
The country’s four largest states – California, Texas, New York and Florida – have all recorded more than 50,000 deaths, nearly a third of the global total.
Once “unimaginable”
The death toll from COVID is now seven times higher than what former President Donald Trump predicted at the start of the pandemic.
“The minimum number was 100,000 lives, and I think we’ll be significantly below that number.… So we’ll see what that ends up being, but it looks like we’re headed for a number that is significantly less than 100,000” , Trump said in April 2020.
However, many health experts, including Jeffrey Shaman, professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia University, were already worried about the onset of the pandemic from the potentially devastating impact of the virus.
“My team and I were able to see very early on that this pathogen had the potential to kill so many people in the United States… I hadn’t foreseen how difficult the answer would be, how the leaders could not or would be. not interested in unifying the country to come together and overcome political differences in order to fight the virus, “Shaman said.” I am saddened that this has not happened. I believe that if that had happened, fewer people would have died and the economic consequences of the pandemic would also have been mitigated. “
Each death is a unique tragedy and an irreparable loss. An analysis, following the extended scope of COVID-19 parentage loss with a bereavement multiplier, published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, estimates that 6.3 million family members could mourn the loss of a be loved by the virus.
Patricia Dowd, a 57-year-old San Jose resident, was the first known American to die of COVID-19 in February 2020. At first, Dowd’s cause of death was not known to be due to the virus. It wasn’t until months later, in April, that an autopsy would reveal that she had died of coronavirus, three weeks before the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention previously identified the first U.S. death linked to the coronavirus.
By the end of May 2020, 100,000 Americans had been confirmed dead. In the coming months, the United States would record 100,000 more coronavirus deaths, and by the time a coronavirus vaccine was cleared for emergency use, a total of 300,000 Americans had died.
When President Joe Biden took office in January, the U.S. death toll from COVID-19 had risen to 400,000, and a month later half a million Americans were dead. In June, they were 600,000 Americans.
“A year and a half ago, the idea of reaching 700,000 coronavirus deaths was totally unimaginable. While these horrific milestones once reflected failures in the public health response, they now reflect our inability to immunize millions of vulnerable Americans, “Brownstein said.
Declining demand for vaccines
This milestone is juxtaposed with a drop in demand for vaccines among Americans, with the current rate of new vaccinations approaching its lowest point since the vaccines were introduced last December.
About 117.4 million Americans are still unvaccinated, of which nearly 70 million are over 12 years old and eligible for a vaccine.
On average, the number of Americans receiving a newly authorized third dose of Pfizer is now greater than the number of Americans initiating a vaccination each day.
“As the winter months approach, we can significantly delay the next grim step if more people, especially those at high risk for serious illness, choose to be vaccinated,” said Ajay Sethi, epidemiologist and associate professor of Population Health Sciences at the University. of Wisconsin-Madison.
Earlier this week, the CDC released new data showing that, overall, vaccines still significantly reduce the risk of being hospitalized or dying from COVID-19 during the current wave of delta variants, as before.
People who have not been fully vaccinated are eight times more likely to test positive, 41 times more likely to be hospitalized and 57 times more likely to die, compared to those vaccinated, according to CDC director Rochelle Walensky.
“We are focusing on the laser to get more shots, especially to vaccinate the unvaccinated. This is our way out of this pandemic. So if you are not vaccinated, please go get the vaccine. It’s free, that’s for sure, it’s easy. It’s going to help make us all safer, “Walensky said at a press conference on Friday.
Disproportionate impact
The country’s racial and ethnic minorities have borne a disproportionate share of hospitalizations and deaths related to COVID-19. According to federal data, adjusted for age and population, the likelihood of death from COVID-19 for blacks, Latinos and Native Americans is two to three times that of whites.
Although the measurements seem to show that the latest wave of the pandemic could subside, experts warn.
“We are not clear,” Shaman said. “New variants may arise which cause more breakthrough and repeated infections, and the virus appears to be naturally more transmissible during the winter.”
Experts who spoke to ABC News agreed that it is essential that more Americans get vaccinated.
“The vast majority of deaths in the future will continue to be those who choose to delay vaccination,” Brownstein added. “While the current downward trajectory of cases offers an optimistic outlook, this trajectory will unfortunately continue to include tens of thousands of vaccine-preventable deaths.”
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