With the Christmas holiday coming at the end of the week, the United States hit a new high for the number of patients hospitalized with the coronavirus, according to the COVID Tracking Projects.
With more than 115,300 people hospitalized with the virus, officials fear a new crush of cases after the holiday season, when people will be anxious to meet with family and friends. The increase in cases the nation is experiencing happened in the weeks after the Thanksgiving holiday; the Hannukah, Christmas and New Year’s holidays could accelerate the case spread.
Another factor that may impact the spread of the virus is a newly found strain of the coronavirus that has a 70% greater chance of causing infection, particularly among younger people. That variant of the virus is spreading through the UK now, but may already be in the United States.
Nearly 1,500 people died of the coronavirus on Monday, with another 180,000 new infections confirmed, according to the COVID Tracking Project.
A different aggregator, Worldometers, logged 200,000 new cases on Monday, with 1,841 fatalities. Every state registered new cases on Monday, with California reaching 43,000 new cases, Texas logging 17,000 and Florida showing 11,000 new cases.