Covid-19: 100 million cases of coronavirus now confirmed worldwide

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A year later, the pandemic shows few signs of loosening its grip on the daily lives of billions of people. Cases continue to rise sharply in some parts of the world, and every day the losses increase as more and more people lose loved ones to Covid-19, lose a business or lose their livelihood.

On January 15, the official global death toll from the coronavirus pandemic exceeded 2 million, according to Johns Hopkins University.

While the 2 million figure is horrifying, experts say the actual death toll is likely much higher. Only confirmed deaths from Covid-19 are included in the tally, meaning people who died without a firm diagnosis may not be included.

Likewise, many people will have been infected with the coronavirus without having had a positive test to confirm it. In the early stages of the pandemic, fewer tests were available, and testing currently remains insufficient in many countries.

Still, with a global population of around 7.67 billion, according to the latest World Bank figures, the global case tally suggests that around one in 76 people have now contracted the virus.

Despite countries imposing measures ranging from travel bans and school closures to full national lockdowns, the coronavirus continued its inexorable spread, reaching every continent in December and leaving a trail of financial hardship, hospitals in trouble and grief in its wake.

The world passed the threshold of 1 million confirmed cases on April 2 and 10 million on June 28, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

It took until November 7 for the world to register 50 million confirmed cases. Since then, the trend has accelerated sharply. The 90 million case mark was crossed less than three weeks ago, on January 10.

European countries impose medical grade masks on homemade fabric face coverings
Almost a quarter of the 100 million cases reported so far have been in the United States, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. And more than 400,000 people have died from Covid-19 in the United States, a tragic step taken on the last full day of Donald Trump’s presidency.

The second most affected country in terms of the overall number of cases, India, accounts for just over a tenth of confirmed cases worldwide. There have been more than 152,000 deaths there, according to Johns Hopkins.

Brazil has reported more than 8.8 million confirmed cases of the virus and 217,000 deaths, the second highest death toll after the United States.

Europe has also been hit hard and many countries are struggling to contain a second wave of infections since the fall. UK has done the worst, with more than 3.6 million confirmed cases and more than 100,000 dead – the fifth highest death toll in the world.

Excess mortality figures released by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, indicate that around 297,500 more deaths occurred in the EU between March and October 2020 compared to the same period from 2016 to 2019.
City workers remove the body of Adamor Mendonca Maciel, 75, from his home in Manaus, Brazil on January 16, 2021 after his death from Covid-19.
A patient is transported out of an ambulance by doctors at the Royal London Hospital on January 2, 2021 in London, England.

As governments around the world seek to limit the spread of the virus, the emergence of new, more infectious variants is of great concern to scientists.

One of these variants was first detected in south-eastern England late last year; another was detected in South Africa and two more in Brazil. Variation has also been observed in the US state of California, which may or may not result in further spread there.

The B.1.1.7 variant first seen in Britain has now been found in at least 60 countries around the world, according to the World Health Organization. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned earlier this month that this could worsen the spread of the pandemic.

Scientists have been rushing to see if the changes in the virus would also make it vulnerable to available treatments and vaccines, amid fears the mutations will allow them to evade some of the immunity induced by the vaccination.

Research published this week provided reassuring evidence that despite these mutations, people vaccinated against Covid-19 will be protected against new, emerging variants.
People line up outside a Covid-19 mass vaccination center in Rabin Square in this aerial photograph taken in Tel Aviv on January 4, 2020.

Mass Covid-19 vaccination programs appear to offer the fastest way out of the pandemic – but countries’ access to vaccine supplies and the ability to distribute and administer vaccines vary widely.

Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, the United States, Denmark and the United Kingdom have led the way in terms of rates of doses administered per 100 people, according to a global monitoring website affiliated with the University of Oxford. But some countries have yet to start rolling out vaccinations.

In the United States, President Joe Biden has set a goal of administering 100 million doses of the vaccine during his first 100 days in office. More than 17.5 million doses had been administered across the country as of Thursday, a day after he was sworn in.

Anthony Fauci, infectious disease expert, said despite challenges with vaccine distribution and administration, the United States “can and should” vaccinate 70-85% of American adults by the end of summer, which could mean some semblance of normalcy by fall.

In the UK, the government is aiming to give all members of the most vulnerable groups at least a first dose by mid-February and to have all adults vaccinated by the fall.

Studies suggest that vaccinated people are protected against new variants of Covid-19

Meanwhile, all those who are not vaccinated around the world must continue to rely on social distancing, hygiene and mask-wearing measures that have become all too familiar since the arrival of Covid-19 on the places.

No one knows how many tens of millions more people around the world will be infected with the coronavirus – or how many millions more will die – before this pandemic is brought under control.

According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 500 million people, or one-third of the world’s population at the time, were infected during the 1918 influenza pandemic. This virus caused at least 50 million deaths, including about 675,000 in the United States, according to the CDC.

In 2021, there is still great hope that science and modern medicine can prevail against Covid-19 with a fraction of that death toll.

CNN’s Byron Manley and Maggie Fox contributed to this report.

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