ONE WORD

I TALY-HEALTH-VIRUS At a May 30 birthday party in Texas, one man reportedly infected 18 friends and family with the coronavirus. Reading reports like these, you might think of the virus as a wildfire, instantly setting off epidemics wherever it goes. But other reports tell another story altogether. In Italy, for example, scientists looked at stored samples of wastewater for the earliest trace of the virus. Last week they reported that the virus was in Turin and Milan as early as Dec. 18. But two months would pass before northern Italy’s hospitals began filling with victims of COVID-19. So those December viruses seem to have petered out. As strange as it may seem, these reports don’t contradict each other. Most infected people don’t pass on the coronavirus to someone else. But a small number pass it on to many others in so-called superspreading events. “You can think about throwing a match at kindling,” said Ben Althouse, principal research scientist at the Institute for Disease Modelin...

If the latest national and state polls are correct, President Trump’s bid for a second term faces serious headwinds in the four months until the election. Nineteen different polls of voters in swing states released this week show Trump trailing former Vice President Joe Biden, including in places Republicans are unaccustomed to losing in a general election. Polls released Thursday by the New York Times/Siena College showed Joe Biden leading Trump by 11 percentage points in Michigan and Wisconsin, by 10 points in Pennsylvania, 9 points in North Carolina, up 7 points in Arizona, and ahead by 6 in Florida. The pollster Hodas & Associates Strategic Communications had similarly bleak news for the president in polls released the same day. In  Michigan , the pollster found, Trump trails Biden by 18 points. He’s behind by 16 points in  Wisconsin  and down 12 points in  Pennsylvania . Redfield & Wilton Strategies also  surveyed voters  in the swing states of...

Vice President Mike Pence hailed “remarkable progress” toward returning the nation to normalcy at the first public briefing of the coronavirus task force in nearly two months on Friday, a day the U.S. saw a new high for coronavirus cases recorded. “We have made truly remarkable progress in moving our nation forward,” Pence told reporters at a briefing held at the Department of Health and Human Services. “We’ve all seen the encouraging news as we open up America again — more than 3 million jobs created in the last jobs report and retail sales are rolling.” Pence said that “all 50 states are opening up safely and responsibly,” but “with cases rising, particularly over the past week throughout the South,” President Trump had asked him to brief the nation on the ongoing emergency. In some of the states where cases are rising fastest, notably Texas and Florida, governors have slowed or reversed measures to reopen businesses and relax social distancing rules. On Friday, the country reported ...

The number of new confirmed  coronavirus  cases in the United States surged to an all-time high with 45,300 new cases reported on Friday, according to  a tally  by Johns Hopkins University. That's up from  40,000 new cases  reported a day earlier. The spike comes more than three months since the first wave mostly struck cities in the country's north and east – and then declined. Thirty-one states have reported jumps in cases compared to two weeks ago, Michael George reports for "CBS This Morning: Saturday." Big increases in COVID-19 cases are now being reported across the Sun Belt. In Texas and Florida, two of the nation's largest states, governors are reversing course and tightening restrictions after coronavirus numbers jumped following their reopenings. Texas reported that more than 5,100 coronavirus patients are currently hospitalized – a record high for the 15th consecutive day. Hospitals in the Texas Medical Center, located in Harris County in the hea...

Lagos State recorded the highest daily COVID-19 infections in the country on Thursday with 159 new cases. This is according to a late-night tweet on the official handle of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) which noted that the country had 594 fresh cases of the virus for the day. A breakdown of the latest figures from the NCDC revealed that Nigeria now has 22, 614 COVID-19 cases. According to the health agency, Delta State had the second highest infections for the day with 106 cases and is followed by Ondo State (44), FCT (34), Edo (34) and  Oyo (33). Other states with fresh cases of the virus are as follows: Kaduna (33), Enugu (28), Katsina, (25), Imo (22) Adamawa (15),  Ogun (12), Osun (11) Abia (8), amd Rivers (6). The remaining states with new COVID-19 cases are Nasarawa (5), Bauchi (5), Niger (5), Kebbi (4), Ekiti (3), Plateau (1), Taraba (1). Of the number of total infections in the country,  7,822 have been discharged with 549 deaths recorded. NCDC...

Nigeria has recorded 649 new COVID-19 cases in the country as total infections from the virus rose to 22, 020. This was confirmed on Wednesday night by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC). According to the health agency, new cases were reported in 21 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. Statistics from the NCDC shows that Lagos remains the epicentre of the virus with 250 cases, closely followed by Oyo State with 100 cases. Similarly, Plateau and Delta both have 40 cases. Other states with reported cases are Abia (28), Kaduna (27), Ogun (22), Edo (20), Akwa Ibom (18) and Kwara (17). While Imo and Kano reported fewer cases with one each, Enugu recorded 14 cases, Niger and Adamawa both share 13 cases. States with low cases include Bayelsa (7), Osun and Bauchi each having 6 cases, Anambra (4), Gombe (3) and Sokoto (2). Meanwhile, the FCT recorded 17 cases. However, the number of deaths increased from 533 reported on Tuesday to 542. On the contr...