California Has More COVID Cases Than All But 4 Countries

With 409K confirmed cases, it has overtaken NY to have the most cases of any state
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Jul 22, 2020 12:21 PM CDT
California Now Has Most COVID Cases of Any State
A closed sign is posted on the window of a barbershop Saturday, July 18, 2020, in Burbank, Calif.   (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

California’s confirmed coronavirus cases have topped 409,000, surpassing New York for most in the nation by about 1,200 cases, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. However, New York's 32,520 deaths are by far the highest total in the country and four times more than California's tally, and its rate of confirmed infections of about 2,100 per 100,000 people is twice California's rate, the AP reports. California is by far the most populous US state, with nearly 40 million people, while New York has about 19.5 million. US government data published Tuesday found that reported and confirmed coronavirus cases vastly underestimate the true number of infections, echoing results from a smaller study last month.

The US also has had consistent testing failures that experts say contribute to an undercount of the actual virus rate. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study said true COVID-19 rates were more than 10 times higher than reported cases in most US regions from late March to early May. It is based on COVID-19 antibody tests performed on routine blood samples in 16,000 people in 10 US regions. California initially succeeded in slowing the spread of the virus, but the state has had a sharp reversal, with COVID-19 infection rates climbing sharply in recent weeks. According to the Johns Hopkins University tracker, only four countries, one of them being the US, have more confirmed cases than California: The others are Brazil, India, and Russia.

(More coronavirus stories.)

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