narvikk/iStockBy MORGAN WINSOR and IVAN PEREIRA, ABC News
(NEW YORK) — A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now infected more than 59.2 million people and killed over 1.3 million worldwide.
Here’s how the news is developing Tuesday. All times Eastern:
Nov 24, 6:16 am
Daily virus deaths hit new high in Russia
Russia registered 491 more fatalities from COVID-19 in the last 24 hours, marking the country’s highest single-day death toll from the disease so far.
An additional 24,326 cases of COVID-19 were also confirmed nationwide, down from the previous day’s peak of 25,173 newly diagnosed infections. The cumulative total now stands at 2,138,828 confirmed cases, including 37,031 deaths, according to Russia’s coronavirus response headquarters.
Russia has seen a resurgence in COVID-19 infections in recent weeks, with multiple back-to-back days of record-high deaths and cases. The Eastern European nation of 145 million people has the fifth-highest tally of confirmed cases in the world, behind only the United States, India, Brazil and France, according to a real-time count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said Tuesday that a mass COVID-19 vaccination campaign is expected to begin next year, according to the Interfax news agency. She noted that immunization will be voluntary.
More than two million doses of Sputnik V, a COVID-19 vaccine developed by the Russian Ministry of Health’s Gamaleya Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, will be produced by the end of the year, Golikova said.
Nov 24, 5:45 am
Death toll from outbreak at Illinois veterans home rises to 27
A COVID-19 outbreak at a veterans home in Illinois has left more than two dozen people dead, according to a report by Chicago ABC station WLS-TV.
At least 27 veterans who lived at the Illinois Veterans Home in LaSalle, some 100 miles southwest of Chicago, have died from COVID-19, according to WLS, which cited the Illinois Department of Veterans.
“That’s over 20 percent of our veterans that have passed away in the past several weeks,” state Sen. Sue Rezin told WLS.
Rezin said the facility, which is in her district, continues to see an alarming rise in COVID-19 cases.
“November 4th, there were only four cases of COVID within the home,” she said. “Very quickly within the past 20 days, we’ve had almost 200 cases.”
The Illinois Senate Veterans Affairs Committee will meet virtually Tuesday to discuss the crises at the LaSalle facility.
“We need answers and we need answers today,” Rezin said.
So far, a total of 96 residents and 93 employees at the Illinois Veterans Home in LaSalle have tested positive for COVID-19, according to a statement from the facility’s administrator, Angela Mehlbrech. The veterans home has been conducting health screenings of its residents and staff, maintaining social distancing practices, wearing face coverings as well as intensifying cleaning and disinfecting protocols.
An infection control team has been sent to the facility, according to Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
“When there is massive, widespread community spread,” Pritzker told WLS, “there’s no way to keep it out of every facility.”
Nov 24, 4:05 am
US reports over 169,000 new cases
There were 169,190 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in the United States on Monday, according to a real-time count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
It’s the 21st straight day that the country has reported over 100,000 newly diagnosed infections. Monday’s count falls under the all-time high of 196,004 new cases on Nov. 20.
An additional 889 fatalities from COVID-19 were also registered nationwide on Monday, down from a peak of 2,609 new deaths on April 15.
A total of 12,420,872 people in the United States have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the pandemic began, and at least 257,701 of them have died, according to Johns Hopkins. The cases include people from all 50 U.S. states, Washington, D.C. and other U.S. territories as well as repatriated citizens.
Much of the country was under lockdown by the end of March as the first wave of pandemic hit. By May 20, all U.S. states had begun lifting stay-at-home orders and other restrictions put in place to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. The day-to-day increase in the country’s cases then hovered around 20,000 for a couple of weeks before shooting back up and crossing 100,000 for the first time on Nov. 4.
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