US coronavirus death toll surpasses 11,000

By Servet Gunerigok

WASHINGTON (AA) - The U.S. passed a grim milestone Tuesday as the death toll from the coronavirus surpassed 11,000 with nearly 370,000 diagnosed cases.

There are now 11,008 deaths and 368,533 cases in the U.S., where the first death took place Feb. 29, according to a running tally by Johns Hopkins University.

U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams warned this week will be very hard for the country.

"This is going to be the hardest and the saddest week of most Americans' lives. This is going to be our Pearl Harbor moment and our 9/11 moment only it's not going to be localized, it's going to be happening all over the country," he told Fox News Sunday.

The doctor leading the White House's coronavirus response team, Deborah Birx, presented a model Wednesday for the potential number of deaths from the virus in the U.S.

It showed between 100,000 and 240,000 could die if the U.S. follows social distancing and public health guidelines. Without any intervention, the model forecasts 1.5 to 2 million deaths.

New York is the state worst-hit by the pandemic with nearly 5,000 deaths. Of the more than 130,600 confirmed infections in the state, more than 4,700 people have died.

The U.S. has become the country with the most confirmed coronavirus infections in the world, followed by Spain, Italy and Germany. Since the virus emerged last December in the Chinese city of Wuhan, it has spread to at least 184 countries and regions.

There are more than 1.36 million confirmed coronavirus infections worldwide and more than 76,400 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. A total of 292,425 have recovered.