COVID Deaths In US Top 50,000, Sooner Than Forecast

The Week reports:

The United States crossed a grim threshold on Friday, when it officially recorded its 50,000th death attributed to the novel coronavirus. The U.S. now accounts for almost a third of the confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide, and more than a quarter of the deaths, according to numbers kept by Johns Hopkins.

Many experts believe the toll of the disease in the U.S. is being underreported, due to insufficient testing and excess mortalities. New York City alone has seen over 15,000 deaths from COVID-19 since the outbreak began.

America’s confirmed coronavirus deaths have now outpaced predictions by experts, who estimated last week that 47,000 would be dead by May 1, a number the country instead hit on Wednesday, April 22.