The U.S. surpassed the grim milestone of 1 million deaths from COVID-19.
NBC News is reporting, based on its own analysis, that the U.S. death toll has reached that total and is the highest in the world. Brazil has the second highest total with just over 660,000 deaths.
The U.S. number is the equivalent to the population of San Jose, California, the 10th largest city in the U.S., according to the network.
The toll was reached at 27 months after the country confirmed its first case of the virus.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's website on Thursday listed a death tally of slightly less: 993,341.
ublic tally listed the death toll as slightly just short of 1 million as of Thursday morning.
Dr. Christopher Murray, chief of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington School of Medicine, said "the fact that so many have died is still appalling."
And he cautioned: "This is far from over."
Gizmodo noted COVID-19 infections are increasing again in the U.S., with 119,865 new cases reported on Wednesday. Those figures reflect data from 43 of the 50 states reporting. According to the website, 767 deaths were recorded on Wednesday.
Dr. Robert Murphy, executive director of the Havey Institute for Global Health at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, said many had anticipated the U.S. to be in a position to better control the virus' spread, according to NBC News.
"We were very encouraged by the rapid development of the vaccines, and everybody really thought we were going to vaccinate our way out of this," he said. "But then we had people that wouldn't even take the damn vaccine."
The CDC said many of the deaths from COVID-19 in the U.S. – more than 80% from April to December 2021 – were unvaccinated Americans, NBC News reported.
Gizmodo, citing data from Johns Hopkins University, said the U.S. is ranked 63rd in the world for COVID-19 vaccinations, with 66.75% of the population fully vaccinated.
Those figures put the U.S. behind Sri Lanka (67.48%), Laos (67.5%), and Iran (68.55%), among others.
Jeffrey Rodack ✉
Jeffrey Rodack, who has nearly a half century in news as a senior editor and city editor for national and local publications, has covered politics for Newsmax for nearly seven years.
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