Experts say the death toll is a serious reminder to follow the restrictions despite optimistic inoculation prospects.
The death toll from the coronavirus pandemic in the United States exceeded 300,000 on the same day the first vaccines against COVID-19 were administered in the country, which has been the hardest hit worldwide in terms of cases and deaths.
The death toll is about five times the number of Americans killed in the Vietnam War and equates to the number of people killed in the September 11, 2001 World Trade Center attacks, 100 times.
According to a Johns Hopkins University count, there have been more than 16 million confirmed cases in the U.S., a county of about 300 million people.
The latest milestone comes amid an increase in infections as the United States enters the colder months.
A health worker receives one of the first coronavirus vaccines on Monday [Jessica Hill/The Associated Press]
It also comes when the first health workers rolled up their sleeves on Monday and received the newly authorized shot of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19. Approximately three million doses are shipped across the United States and will reach more than 600 locations on Wednesday.
Monday’s first shots marked the start of the largest vaccination campaign in American history. If a second vaccine, produced by Moderna Inc, is authorized in the coming days, officials say 20 million people could be vaccinated by the end of the month.
The head of the White House vaccine program has said that everyone in the country who wants the vaccine should be able to receive it by mid-2021 if development, approval and distribution are achieved in the plan.
Health experts have warned that initial doses of the vaccine will do little to curb the current rise, which has threatened to invade health systems in several areas.
New administration, new approach
Meanwhile, a very different approach to the virus is expected under the administration of President-elect Joe Biden, who has said his first priority in office will be a thorough and disciplined effort to defeat the outbreak.
On Monday, voters from the 50 states and the District of Columbia gathered to cast their ballots in the Electoral College, the most important step so far in Biden that consolidated its victory in the presidential election.
Globally, the virus is blamed for more than 1.6 million deaths and more than 72 million cases, according to a Johns Hopkins count.
Health experts say the 300,000 U.S. deaths should serve as a reminder to stay alert as inoculations are administered in the coming months.
Health officials say 20 million could be vaccinated by the end of the month if a second vaccine is approved [Jessica Hill/The Associated Press]
With a cold climate driving people indoors, where the virus spreads more easily and many Americans despise masks and other precautions, some public health authorities predict that 100,000 more could die before the end of January.
“We’re probably entering the worst possible period because of all the things we had in the spring, which are fatigue, political resilience, maybe the loss of all the goodwill we had from the people who did their part,” Jennifer Nuzzo, a public health researcher at Johns Hopkins, told Reuters news agency.
Nuzzo contrasted the government’s scattered response with the mass mobilization that took place after the deaths of nearly 3,000 Americans in the September 11, 2001 attacks.
“Thinking now we can only absorb in our country 3,000 deaths a day as if it were a normal business, it just represents a moral failure,” he said.