The number of known corona infections worldwide has risen from 15 million to over 20 million in less than three weeks. This came out of data from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore on Monday.
About half of the confirmed infections therefore affected only three countries: the United States with more than five million infections, Brazil with more than three million and a good two million in India.
The number of confirmed infections worldwide stood at ten million at the end of June and has therefore doubled in about six weeks. In addition to the countries most affected, the coronavirus pandemic continued to spread rapidly in Russia, South Africa, Mexico and several countries in South America.
According to Johns Hopkins, more than 730,000 people worldwide have died after being infected with the coronavirus. The number of victims has recently increased much more slowly than the number of new infections, in part thanks to better treatment options. The pathogen Sars-CoV-2 can cause Covid-19 lung disease, which can be life threatening, especially for the elderly and immunocompromised.
The worst affected country in the world in absolute terms has been the United States. Besides the most confirmed infections with more than 163,000 victims, there are also the most deaths. Brazil comes second with more than 100,000 dead.
The university’s website is regularly updated with incoming data and therefore mostly displays a level above the official World Health Organization (WHO) figures. In some cases, however, the numbers have recently been revised downwards. According to the WHO, there were 19.7 million confirmed infections and 728,000 deaths as of Monday. The pandemic began around the start of the year in the Chinese metropolis of Wuhan.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 200811-99-121142 / 3
