ABC National News Test 

Coronavirus updates: Trump can return to 'public engagements' on Saturday, doctor says

WKXA

Samara Heisz/iStockBy MORGAN WINSOR and EMILY SHAPIRO, ABC News

(NEW YORK) — A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now killed more than one million people worldwide.

Over 36.4 million people across the globe have been diagnosed with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new respiratory virus, according to data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. The criteria for diagnosis — through clinical means or a lab test — has varied from country-to-country. Still, the actual numbers are believed to be much higher due to testing shortages, many unreported cases and suspicions that some national governments are hiding or downplaying the scope of their outbreaks.

Since the first cases were detected in China in December, the virus has rapidly spread to every continent except Antarctica.

The United States is the worst-affected country, with more than 7.6 million diagnosed cases and at least 212,716 deaths.

California has the most cases of any U.S. state, with more than 845,000 people diagnosed, according to Johns Hopkins data. California is followed by Texas and Florida, with over 807,000 cases and over 726,000 cases, respectively.

More than 190 vaccine candidates for COVID-19 are being tracked by the World Health Organization, at least 10 of which are in crucial phase three studies. Of those 10 in late-stage trials, there are currently five that will be available in the United States if approved.

Here’s how the news developed Thursday. All times Eastern:

Oct 08, 11:06 pm
Trump says he may hold campaign event Saturday in Florida

Fresh off a declaration from his doctor that he can resume “public engagements” on Saturday, the president told Fox News’ Sean Hannity Thursday night that he hopes to hold a rally over the weekend in Florida.

“I think I’m going to try doing a rally on Saturday night if we have enough time to put it together, but we want to do a rally probably in Florida on Saturday night,” Trump told Hannity. “I might come back and do one in Pennsylvania the following night and it’s incredible what’s going on. I feel so good.”

Dr. Sean Conley, his physician, said in a letter earlier in the evening that Trump was doing well, had no symptoms and should be able to hold public events again 10 days after he was diagnosed.

Trump said he will be tested for the virus on Friday. He wasn’t clear on when his last test had been.

He also reiterated he will not take part in a virtual town hall as had been planned for Oct. 15 due to his illness, and will instead hold a rally on that night. Joe Biden is set to hold a town hall in Philadelphia with ABC News as host.

Oct 08, 9:03 pm
Four states report record new cases

Four states reported record numbers of new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, according to The COVID Tracking Project.

Wisconsin, North Dakota, Wyoming and Utah saw the high case counts, as the virus surges in the Upper Midwest and parts of the West.

Wisconsin, North Dakota and Wyoming also reported a record number of current hospitalizations, according to the tracker.

Montana reported a record number of hospitalizations on Thursday, a day after it saw a record for new cases.

Oct 08, 7:27 pm
Doctor says Trump can return to public engagements on Saturday

President Donald Trump’s doctors said he has “responded extremely well to treatment” for COVID-19 and should be able to return to public engagements on Saturday, according to a memo released Thursday evening.

“Since returning home, his physical exam has remained stable and devoid of any indications of illness,” Dr. Sean Conley wrote. “Overall he’s responded extremely well to treatment, without evidence on examination of adverse therapeutic effects.”

The doctor also said Trump should be able to return to the campaign trail on Saturday. Trump had fought for an in-person debate with former Vice President Donald Trump this week, but the Commission on Presidential Debates decided to make the event virtual and Trump said he would not participate.

“Saturday will be day 10 since Thursday’s diagnosis, and based on the trajectory of advanced diagnostics the team has been conducting, I fully anticipate the President’s safe return to public engagements at that time,” Conley wrote.

The Trump campaign had canceled all of Trump’s events when he was diagnosed with COVID-19. It has not yet announced when he will return to the campaign trail

Oct 08, 2:52 pm
Ohio cases on ‘concerning upward trend’

Ohio reported 1,539 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, in what the governor called the continuation of a “concerning upward trend.”

“Ohio’s positivity rate has jumped to 3.9% and the 7-day rolling average is 3.3%,” Gov. Mike DeWine tweeted. “This reflects the ongoing increasing trend of virus spread that we are seeing throughout the state. These numbers are not good.”

Thirteen more deaths were reported in the last 24 hours, bringing the state’s fatality total to 4,983, according to numbers released by the governor. Over 164,000 people in Ohio have been diagnosed with COVID-19.

Oct 08, 11:52 am
150 million people set to fall into ‘extreme poverty’ due to pandemic, World Bank warns

The World Bank has warned that 150 million people could fall into “extreme poverty” by the end of 2021, due to the coronavirus pandemic and accompanying worldwide recession with the levels of poverty set to rise for the first time in 20 years.

In its biennial report on poverty and shared prosperity, the World Bank estimates between 9.1% and 9.4% of the global population would be affected by extreme poverty, which the multilateral development lender defines as living on under $1.90 a day. Had the pandemic not hit, the rate was forecast to fall to 7.9% this year.

“In order to reverse this serious setback to development progress and poverty reduction, countries will need to prepare for a different economy post-COVID, by allowing capital, labor, skills and innovation to move into new businesses and sectors,” World Bank president David Malpass said in a statement Wednesday.

While extreme poverty rates are on the rise, around a quarter of the world’s population live on less than $3.20 per day and more than 40% live on $5.50.

Overall, levels of extreme poverty have been steadily declining over the past quarter of a decade. Some 1.9 billion people lived in extreme poverty in 1990, compared to 689 million in 2017, according to the World Bank. In addition to the coronavirus pandemic, the report cites military conflict and climate change as two significant factors behind the recent reversal.

Extreme poverty is usually most keenly felt in rural areas, but that is now spreading to urban hubs. Around 82% of the number of people forecast to slide into extreme poverty will be living in middle-income countries, according to the report.

ABC News’ Guy Davies contributed to this report.

Oct 08, 11:23 am
840,000 more Americans file for unemployment insurance

Another 840,000 Americans sought unemployment insurance last week, according to the latest report from the U.S. Department of Labor released Thursday.

This week’s claims do not include the most up-to-date data from California, which has temporarily stopped accepting new jobless claims in order to work through a backlog and implement fraud prevention technology, the department said. Instead, the figure from California will reflect the level reported during the week prior to the pause in new applications.

Still, the initial claims data reflect a labor market still suffering some six months into the coronavirus pandemic. This is the 29th straight week of weekly unemployment claims coming in above the pre-pandemic record set in 1982.

While the number of new claims has dropped slightly since peaking in late March, they have stagnated at unprecedented levels not seen prior to the COVID-19 crisis. The average for the past four weeks was 857,000 new claims per week, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

ABC News’ Catherine Thorbecke contributed to this report.

Oct 08, 11:08 am
COVID-19 killed more people in England and Wales this year than flu and pneumonia, data shows

The disease caused by the novel coronavirus killed three times more people in England and Wales during the first eight months of this year than influenza and pneumonia combined, according to new data released Thursday by the U.K. Office for National Statistics (ONS).

“More than three times as many deaths were recorded between January and August this year where COVID-19 was the underlying cause compared to influenza and pneumonia,” Sarah Caul, head of mortality analysis at the ONS, said in a statement. “The mortality rate for COVID-19 is also significantly higher than influenza and pneumonia rates for both 2020 and the five-year average.”

The highest number of deaths due to influenza and pneumonia occurred in January; however, deaths from influenza and pneumonia were below the five-year average — 2015 to 2019 — in every month of 2020, according to the ONS.

“Since 1959, which is when ONS monthly death records began, the number of deaths due to influenza and pneumonia in the first eight months of every year have been lower than the number of COVID-19 deaths seen, so far, in 2020,” Caul said.

Meanwhile, the proportion of deaths occurring in care homes due to COVID-19 — 30% — was almost double the proportion of deaths due to influenza and pneumonia — 15.2%, according to the ONS.

The U.K. agency noted that its analysis of COVID-19, influenza and pneumonia deaths focused on fatalities where people died due to those conditions, rather than deaths where the conditions were either the underlying cause or mentioned as a contributing factor.

Oct 08, 10:09 am
COVID-19 hospitalizations reach record high in Oklahoma

The number of current hospitalizations in Oklahoma due to COVID-19 has soared to a new record one-day high.

The Oklahoma State Department of Health on Wednesday reported 738 people hospitalized with either confirmed or possible cases of the disease.

Since the start of the pandemic, at least 94,352 people in Oklahoma have been diagnosed with COVID-19 and 1,075 of them have died, according to the state health department data.

Oct 08, 8:58 am
University of New Haven quarantines hundreds of students amid outbreak

Hundreds of students at the University of New Haven have been ordered to quarantine amid a COVID-19 outbreak on campus.

Since the start of the month, the private university in Connecticut has identified 24 positive cases of COVID-19, at least 19 of which were confirmed this week. In a letter to students Wednesday, university officials explained that a “critical mass” of those cases are clustered in the school’s Winchester Hall dormitory, prompting them to impose a “full-building quarantine” until Oct. 20.

Currently, 280 students are being quarantined on campus and nearly 70 are quarantining off campus, according to the letter.

“We must reverse this trend immediately,” the letter said. “Candidly, much of this could have been avoided if everyone had followed the regulations in place.”

Since the beginning of the fall semester, the university has investigated almost 300 reports of alleged COVID-19 policy violations and has handed down more than 150 disciplinary sanctions, ranging from warnings to housing suspensions.

“Any significant increase in cases could threaten our ability to continue on-campus operations or force us to, as other schools in Connecticut and across to country have had to do — transition to completely online learning,” the letter warned. “That is an outcome none of us want to see.”

Oct 08, 7:43 am
Germany sees highest daily increase in cases since April

Germany confirmed 4,058 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, an increase of 1,230 from the previous day, marking the country’s highest daily caseload since April.

An additional 16 coronavirus-related deaths were also recorded Wednesday. The cumulative total now stands at 310,144 cases with 9,578 deaths, according to the latest data from the country’s public health institute.

The number of daily cases recorded in Germany reached almost 7,000 during the height of the pandemic at the end of March and in early April. Although the figures have fallen significantly since then, Germany’s infections have been on the rise in recent months amid a second wave across Europe.

Earlier this week, the German government announced new curfews for bars, cafes, pubs and restaurants in the capital Berlin and financial hub Frankfurt, along with stricter rules on social gatherings.

Oct 08, 6:47 am
Analysis shows cases increasing in 32 US states

An ABC News analysis of COVID-19 trends across all 50 U.S. states as well as Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico found there were increases in newly confirmed cases over the past two weeks in 32 states.

The analysis also found increases in the daily positivity rate of COVID-19 tests in 25 states, increases in COVID-19 hospitalizations in 35 states and increases in daily COVID-19 death tolls in 19 states.

The seven-day average of new cases in the United States has now surpassed 43,000, the highest it has been since Aug. 22. Regionally, new cases are on the rise across the Northeast, the Midwest, the South and the West.

One state — Montana — reported its highest single-day rise in the number of new COVID-19 cases. Seven states — Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Wyoming — hit a record number of current COVID-19 hospitalizations in a day.

The trends were all analyzed from data collected and published by the COVID Tracking Project over the past two weeks, using the linear regression trend line of the seven-day moving average.

Oct 08, 6:26 am
New cases and ICU usage on the rise in US, FEMA memo says

An internal memo from the Federal Emergency Management Agency obtained by ABC News on Wednesday night shows that the number of new COVID-19 cases recorded in the United States and the nationwide usage of intensive care units are both on the rise in week-over-week comparisons.

There were 306,965 new cases confirmed during the period of Sept. 30-Oct. 6, a 4.8% increase from the previous week. There were also 4,860 coronavirus-related fatalities recorded during the period of Sept. 30-Oct. 6, a 4.6% decrease compared with the week prior, according to the memo.

Meanwhile, the national positivity rate for COVID-19 tests increased from 4.5% to 5.4% in week-to-week comparisons. Currently, 23% of hospitals across the country have more than 80% of beds full in their intensive care units. That figure was 17-18% during the summertime peak, the memo said.

The memo, which is circulated to the highest levels of the federal government and is used to determine daily priorities for the agencies working on COVID-19 response, shows that 32 U.S. states and territories are in an upward trajectory of infections, while eight jurisdictions are at a plateau and 16 others are in a downward trend.

In Florida, 75% of ICU beds statewide are occupied. The number of new COVID-19 deaths doubled in Duval County in week-to-week comparisons, while Sumter County recently reported a single-day positivity rate for COVID-19 tests of over 20%, according to the memo.

Kentucky reported its highest single-day rise in COVID-19 cases on Oct. 3. Nearly half of current cases in northern Kentucky are patients younger than 40, and approximately 40% of them are under 30. The total number of COVID-19 hospitalizations has been increasing statewide since the end of September, the memo said.

The seven-day COVID-19 hospitalization rate continues to rise in Minnesota, reaching its highest since June 1 at 9.8 per 100,000 population, according to the memo.

In Ohio, the number of new COVID-19 cases has more than doubled in Muskingum County between the weeks ending Sept. 27 and Oct. 4. Outbreaks have been discovered at four social clubs there, according to the memo.

Wisconsin’s seven-day COVID-19 death rate has increased 139% from Sept. 27 to Oct. 4. The seven-day COVID-19 hospitalization rate also continues to climb, with Wisconsin reporting a peak of 16.4 per 100,000 population on Oct. 4. The state saw a record high of 782 COVID-19 hospitalizations on Oct. 5, more than double the amount a month earlier. As of Oct. 4, 84% of ICU beds statewide were in use. Local health departments in the counties of Fox Valley, Door and Manitowoc report seeing so many new cases that they are unable to conduct tests or contact tracing in a timely manner, the memo said.

Oct 08, 5:17 am
US reports over 50,000 new cases

There were 50,341 new cases of COVID-19 identified in the United States on Wednesday, driving the country’s cumulative total past 7.5 million, according to a real-time count kept by Johns Hopkins University.

The latest daily tally is up by nearly 10,000 from the previous day but is still under the country’s record set on July 16, when there were 77,255 new cases in a 24-hour reporting period.

An additional 915 coronavirus-related fatalities were also recorded Wednesday, down from a peak of 2,666 new fatalities reported on April 17.

A total of 7,550,731 people in the United States have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the pandemic began, and at least 211,834 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.

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 70,000 for the first time in mid-July. The daily tally of new cases has gradually come down since then but has hovered around 40,000 in recent weeks.

Oct 08, 4:38 am
Czech Republic sees record rise in cases for second straight day

The Czech Republic identified 5,335 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, its highest single-day rise yet.

It’s the first time the central European nation has registered more than 5,000 new cases in one day. The previous record of 4,457 new cases in a 24-hour reporting period was just set the day before.

The cumulative total now stands at 95,360 confirmed cases with 829 deaths, according to the latest data from the Czech health ministry.

More than 43,000 cases were active Wednesday, including 1,563 patients who remained hospitalized for COVID-19, while over 50,000 have recovered from the disease, according to the health ministry data.

The Czech Republic has the highest rate of COVID-19 infection in Europe. Over the past two weeks, the country of 10.7 million people has reported 346.1 cases per 100,000, surpassing Spain for the first time, which has seen 305 cases per 100,000, according to data published Tuesday by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.

Earlier this week, the Czech government declared another state of emergency due to the rapid increase in COVID-19 infections, after having relaxed almost all restrictions over the summer. The government is expected on Friday to announce new measures to contain the outbreak.

The Czech Republic is among a handful of European countries, including France, Spain and the United Kingdom, that are grappling with an uptick in COVID-19 cases as a second wave of infections hits the region.

Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.