The United States recorded more than 1,000 deaths from Covid-19 for the fourth straight day on Friday but a top White House adviser on the pandemic said she saw signs that the worst could be past in hard-hit southern and western states.
At least 1,019 fatalities due to Covid-19 were confirmed nationwide on Friday, following 1,140 on Thursday, 1,135 on Wednesday and 1,141 on Tuesday. Total cases across the United States rose by at least 68,800 on Friday to over 4 million.
The numbers have been driven in large part by a surge in infections in Arizona, California, Florida, Texas and California.
"We're already starting to see some plateauing in these critically four states that have really suffered under the last four weeks, so Texas, California, Arizona and Florida, those major metros and throughout their counties," Dr Deborah Birx told NBC news in an interview.
Ms Birx's comments came as federal health and education officials stressed the need for children to return to in-class instruction. The American public and its leaders have been sharply divided over whether students should return to school for the fall term during the pandemic.
Ms Birx said children under the age of 18 are typically less sick than older adults from the sometimes deadly illness but called it an "open question" how readily those under 10 can spread the virus.
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An Indian woman wears a mask due to the outbreak of Covid-19 in Bangalore, India. EPA -
Models present creations during a fashion show, wearing masks as a measure to avoid the spread of the Covid-19, in Seoul, South Korea. Reuters -
A patient looks on as their nasal and throat swabs are put into a test tube, during walk-up Covid-19 testing in a mobile diagnostic tent in San Gregorio Atlapulco in the Xochimilco district of Mexico City. AP Photo -
Salvadoran Rebeca Valle de Barrera, right, and her five children show a picture of her deceased husband Joaquin Barrera who, along with her parents and two other brothers, recently died of Covid-19, at their home in Santiago Nonualco, La Paz department, El Salvador. AFP -
A Covid-19 patient reacts after being tested inside a field hospital built on a football stadium in Machakos, as the number of confirmed Covid-19 cases continues to rise in Kenya. Reuters -
A man walks past by a mural by artist Cosimo Cheone dedicated to nurses of Sacco hospital, in Milan, Italy. AP Photo -
A woman carries a baby as she lines up to receive a hot meal from municipal workers at Ciudad Peronia neighborhood in Villa Nueva municipality in Guatemala. AFP -
Teacher Maura Silva, who works for public school Escola Municipal Frei Vicente de Salvador and who created a "hug kit" using plastic covers, embraces her student Yuri Araujo Silva at Yuri's home in the 77 Padre Miguel slum in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Reuters -
Employees from several maid-themed cafes of Akihabara pray during a prayer-meeting for protection from Covid-19 and for a thriving business at the Kanda Myojin shrine in Tokyo. AP Photo -
A sign informs customers at the Edison Hotel restaurant about wearing a protective face mask during the coronavirus pandemic, along Ocean Drive in Miami Beach, Florida, USA. AP Photo -
Worshippers socially distanced and wearing face masks kneel on their personal prayer mats during Friday prayers at Madina Masjid, Sheffield's central mosque, in Sheffield, northern England. AFP -
Visitors listen to the sound installation “eleven songs – halle am berghain” at Berghain club in Berlin, Germany. AFP -
Shopping mall workers wearing masks for protection against the Covid-19 wait for a shuttle outside a mall, in Makati City, Metro Manila, Philippines. Reuters -
A man wearing a protective face mask walks at Mid-Levels Central, following the Covid-19 outbreak in Hong Kong, China. Reuters -
A masked man rides a UFO-shaped toy car at a park in Cali, Colombia before a night curfew starts against the spread of the new coronavirus. AFP
US President Donald Trump has pushed for schools to reopen, saying that it was critical to the mental and emotional well-being of children and the ability of their parents to work.
Elsewhere, Vietnam was back on high alert for the novel coronavirus on Saturday after medical officials in the central city of Danang detected, its first locally transmitted case for three months.
Thanks to strict quarantine measures and an aggressive and widespread testing programme, the Southeast Asian country has kept its virus total to an impressively low 415 cases and had reported no locally transmitted infections for 100 days.
Cases continued to rise elsewhere in the world. Almost 40 countries have reported record single-day increases in coronavirus infections over the past week, around double the number that did so the previous week, according to figures showing a pick-up in the pandemic in every region of the world.
The rate of cases has been increasing not only in countries like the United States, Brazil and India, which have dominated global headlines with large outbreaks, but in Australia, Japan, Bolivia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Bulgaria, Belgium, Uzbekistan and Israel, among others.
Many countries, especially those where officials eased earlier social distancing lockdowns, are experiencing a second peak more than a month after recording their first.
"We will not be going back to the 'old normal'. The pandemic has already changed the way we live our lives," World Health Organisation (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said this week. "We're asking everyone to treat the decisions about where they go, what they do and who they meet with as life-and-death decisions because they are."
Hong Kong reported 133 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, including 126 that were locally transmitted, a record for a daily increase, as authorities warned that the city faces a critical period in containing the virus.
Ukraine reported 1,106 new cases of the coronavirus within a 24-hour period, the highest daily toll since a record on June 26, when it reached 1,109, Health Minister Maksym Stepanov said on Saturday.
Governments are fast losing support for their handling of the coronavirus outbreak from a public that widely believes death and infection figures to be higher than statistics show, a survey of six countries revealed Saturday.
Support for the federal government of the United States, the country with the most reported infections and deaths, dropped by four percentage points from mid-June, with 44 per cent of respondents declaring themselves dissatisfied, said a report by the Kekst CNC communications consulting group.
In Britain, just over a third of respondents approved of their government's actions, a three-point decline in one month, according to the report, based on an opinion poll conducted over five days in mid-July.
It also included France, Sweden, Japan and Germany.
"In most countries this month, support for national governments is falling," the report said.
The notable exception was France, where approval rose by six percentage points, yielding a dissatisfaction rate of 41 per cent.
