Yesterday we celebrated change, now we need to get back to work. 240,000 deaths in the US. 10 million cases.

 The United States could soon report more than 200,000 coronavirus cases per day as infections continue to surge across the country, according to CNN.

The US reported 100,000 new cases 7 days in a row last week, and that total will likely continue to increase.

"We are watching cases increase substantially in this country — far beyond, I think, what most people ever thought could happen," Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, told CNN.

Osterholm and his team have created accurate forecasts for COVID-19 cases throughout the pandemic. He was named to President-elect Joe Biden's Transition COVID-19 Advisory Board on Monday.

"It will not surprise me if, in the next weeks, we see over 200,000 new cases a day," he said.

On Monday, the national 7-day average of new cases was nearly 120,000, which is triple the average from mid-September.

The number of hospitalizations in the United States are up as well, according to The COVID Tracking Project. On Monday, 59,275 people were in hospitals for COVID-19, marking the country's highest total since July and slightly lower than the April 15 peak of 59,940.

Deaths are on the rise, too, CNN reported. Last week, more than 1000 COVID-19 deaths were reported for 5 days in a row, which hasn't happened since August.

"We're going to see, by far, the darkest days of this pandemic between now and next spring when the vaccine becomes available," Osterholm told CBS This Morning on Tuesday.

"We have a perfect storm coming together," he said. "We have pandemic fatigue...we have pandemic anger...we just are not taking this virus seriously."

WebMD Health News © 2020 

Cite this: Carolyn Crist. US Could Hit 200,000 Daily COVID-19 Cases Soon - Medscape - Nov 10, 2020.

This article should cause you to sit up and take notice. The number of cases are rising throughout the country again, including Maryland.

Current hospitalized cases in Maryland 761, in total we have had 156,709 cases. Our positivity rate is back up to 5.24% total death count 4084.

One of my biggest worries is that this is happening BEFORE Thanksgiving and the onset of the flu season. In a few weeks it could be way worse. Please do not allow “Covid fatigue” to let your guard down. It is not in your best interest and all it takes is being careless.

Maybe things will start to improve now but only if everyone plays their part. We haven’t even begun to turn the corner yet but maybe we can in January now that all the crazy rallies are over.

2 positive things: A new presidential task force (which includes people from my alma mater, yay!) and the imminent release of a vaccine.

Pfizer released their report yesterday that their new recombinant vaccine is 90% effective. Unfortunately there hasn’t been the usual time for ‘peer review’ because they said they would not have been able to keep it secret for the usual month it takes for that process. None-the-less the numbers still have to be examined and then cleared by the FDA. I worry that the media attention will pressurize the FDA to allow emergency clearance which will lead to distrust on the part of the public.

Anyway, as I have said many times, this is not when you need to be focusing on the vaccine. Focus on your life style choices which is something you have control over.

So “Happy Thanksgiving!” is in words only. I really don’t mean it literally.

If it makes you feel better, they plan on using the vaccine on us (medical workers) first. Whoopee!