Leading public health officials, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, also warned that autumn and winter in the US could be particularly tough this year as the social environment moves indoors in cold weather. They say all services in cities and counties must prepare themselves with safety measures, and residents must wear masks and must observe social distancing.
Coronavirus cases are on the rise in New York and Wisconsin. The seven-day average of new daily official cases in Wisconsin peaked on Wednesday at 2,334, well above the 600 and 700 averages seen in late August.
The situation is getting worse in Illinois as well. According to Johns Hopkins University staff, 27 states have reported higher average seven-day new daily cases today than a week ago. Nationwide, more than 7.2 million people have been infected and more than 207,000 have died.
All officials, doctors, experts urge Americans to pay attention to the first symptoms: if you have lost your sense of smell or taste, this is a likely sign that infection with Covid-19 has occurred. In this case, you need to immediately self-isolate and do a coronavirus test.
A group from University College London studied 590 volunteers who lost their smell or taste. They tested 567 of them for coronavirus. Of the 567, over 77% tested positive for antibodies to SARS-CoV-2. Overall, 80.4% of participants reported a loss of odor and 77.8% of those who reported a loss of taste tested positive, the team reported in the journal PLoS Medicine.
Almost 40% of those who tested positive for antibodies had no fever or cough.