Thanksgiving coronavirus surge could turn into Christmas surge

4 min readNov 26, 2020

The United States is living in the most dangerous public health moment since the 1918 influenza pandemic, Michael Osterholm, the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said Wednesday.

“The challenges we have before us right now with the ever increasing number of cases, rapidly increasing number of cases in many areas, that we are going to see our hospitals literally on the verge of collapse,” Osterholm told CNN’s Jim Acosta. “That’s what we have to understand we’re where we’re at right now.”

The US is seeing close to 200,000 new Covid-19 cases every day, and health experts have predicted that number could increase.

“I worry that the Thanksgiving Day surge will then just add into what will become the Christmas surge, which will then make this one seem as if it wasn’t so bad,” said Osterholm, a member of the Biden-Harris Covid-19 Advisory Council.

“So, we have to understand we’re in a very dangerous place. People have to stop swapping air. It’s just that simple,” he said.

“And if we don’t, we’re going to see many, many of our friends, colleagues and loved ones ending up in a hospital and, unfortunately, some of them not making it,” he added.

More than 2,000 deaths from Covid-19 reported in the US today

From CNN’s Jamiel Lynch

The United States reported more than 2,000 deaths from Covid-19 today, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

Currently the country has reported 2,046 new deaths today.

This is the 22nd day that the US has ever added more than 2,000 new deaths. US had not seen new death numbers this high since May.

Wyoming governor tests positive for Covid-19

From CNN’s Andy Rose

Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon tested positive for Covid-19 Wednesday, his office confirmed.

The governor is experiencing “mild symptoms” and will be working from home in isolation for an indefinite period, his spokesperson Michael Pearlman told CNN.

Gordon’s diagnosis comes one day after the state Capitol in Cheyenne was closed because an unidentified member of the governor’s staff had received a positive test.

Pearlman said they do not know whether the governor caught the virus from his staffer.

Germany will extend its partial nationwide lockdown

From CNN’s Nadine Schmidt and Duarte Mendonca

Germany will extend its partial nationwide lockdown until at least Dec. 20 or potentially stretch it until January, keeping existing curbs in place as a way to slow the spread of coronavirus, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced at a news conference on Wednesday.

“Infection numbers remain at a level that is far too high,” Merkel said.

The partial nationwide lockdown means the German government requires restaurants and bars to remain closed, people to avoid travel, to keep their contacts to an absolute minimum and to limit public meetings to members of only two households. Schools and shops have remained open.

Despite the extension, restrictions are expected to ease from Dec. 23 until Jan. 1, with “closest family or friendship circle” allowed to meet in groups of up to 10 people — “not counting children,” Merkel said.

Merkel also announced that mask-wearing is now obligatory in all pedestrian high-traffic areas and city centers.

These announcements come after Germany recorded 410 deaths related to coronavirus in the past 24 hours — the highest single-day jump in fatalities since the outbreak began, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the country’s disease and control agency, said on Wednesday.

Thanksgiving coronavirus surge could turn into Christmas surge

More than 2,000 deaths from Covid-19 reported in the US today

Wyoming governor tests positive for Covid-19

Germany will extend its partial nationwide lockdown

Written by Aman

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