Covid’s cases are reaching a low point in America as the nation begins to move forward from winter Omicron wave and the pandemic in general. The United States registered only 7,464 new infections on Sunday and places with the most stringent measures such as new York and Chicago lift the remaining mandates.
While Sunday is always a day when the United States registers fewer infections than others – many local health departments are closed during the day – this is the first time less than 10,000 cases have been reported in a single day since July 11 last year. The previous “small” Sunday sums so far this year have been over 70,000.
The average daily number of cases in the country has fallen to 66,337 per day, down 34 percent in the past week and a staggering 91 percent drop from a record 800,000 cases a day in mid-January.
As cases continue to dwindle, pandemic-related restrictions on Americans are beginning to disappear. Almost every state in America has either revoked the mask orders or set a day for it in the near future. Even the United States Capitolwhich has a controversial mandate for masks since lawmakers returned in the summer of 2020, repealed orders for masks over the weekend.
Vaccine mandates, arguably the most controversial Covid-related mandates, are also beginning to be a thing of the past. New York Mayor Eric Adams said on Sunday that he would soon cancel vaccine checks needed for many entertainment and fitness venues. However, the mandates of employers will remain in force for the time being.
Masks in schools will become a thing of the past in New York. Gov. Katie Hochul – who had already revoked orders for indoor masks earlier this month – lifted the state’s mandate for school masks over the weekend. The change will take effect on March 2.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams (left) has chosen to lift the city’s mandate for a vaccine for indoor nutrition, fitness and entertainment. Gov. Katie Hochul (right) announced over the weekend that the state’s mask for the school mask would be revoked on March 2nd.
According to revised CDC guidelines, 70% of Americans no longer live under a mask recommendation
Chicago, another of the bluest states in America, which had some of the strictest rules during the pandemic, will lift mandates for masks and vaccines on Monday as cases continue to decline indefinitely in Windy City.
Federal officials finally moved on Friday. After weeks of dragging with changing mask orders, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has revised the way it calculates the risk of Covid for each county. Instead of just counting the cases, the agency will now seriously weigh the hospitalization rate and hospital capacity in each U.S. county.
Previously, 95 percent of U.S. counties, which have almost every U.S. resident, were thought to live in an area with “high” or “significant” transmission. According to the new changes, now only 37 percent of counties containing 28 percent of Americans are under the mask recommendation. The “substantial” classification has been removed and 40 percent of the counties are considered “medium” risk, and 23 percent are considered “low” risk.
In recent weeks, the CDC has been under pressure to remove mask recommendations due to declining cases across the country. However, the agency was moving slowly, with 49 of the 50 states – Hawaii the most remote – making plans to remove face coatings even before the CDC’s revised guidelines.
California, the nation’s most populous state, is even moving to put the pandemic behind it all. Two weeks ago, California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that California would soon switch to treating COVID-19 as an endemic, moving away from the pandemic, as the state marks two years since the first cases of the virus were discovered in the United States.
Golden State is now the first state in the United States to declare the virus “endemic”, although some others have decided that the pandemic is completely over without any plans to deal with the virus in the future.
Covid’s daily deaths in America also continue to decline. The nation has an average of 1,755 deaths a day, down 19 percent in the past week. Hospitalizations, a largely inaccurate statistic used by the CDC as a basis for risk level calculations, have also fallen 43 percent in the past two weeks, with 52,909 Covid-positive people receiving treatment each day.
Covid cases have been declining in the last two weeks in all 50 US states. Mississippi, one of the least vaccinated states in America, saw the sharpest drop in cases, with daily infections down 86 percent in the past week. Magnolia was one of the last states on the East Coast to be hit by Omicron, and was a longtime leader in Covid mortality. The state now records only 0.83 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants.
No state records 100 daily infections per 100,000 population, with Idaho leading the way with 82 daily cases per 100,000 population.
Both Nebraska and Maryland have almost eliminated Covid from the United States so far, each registering less than ten infections a day per 100,000 residents.
Ohio leads the United States in Covid mortality, averaging 1.33 deaths a day per 100,000 residents. Buckeye, which has vaccinated only 58 percent of its population, is one of five states to record more than one daily death per 100,000 population.
