Contact tracers with the Houston Health Department monitor the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Houston, Texas, US, on July 22, 2020. (Photo by Reuters)

The United States has set yet another single-day record of fatalities attributed to the new coronavirus as some 1,100 people were reported to have lost their lives to the virus on Wednesday.

Deaths from COVID-19, the disease caused by the new virus, rose by 1,101 on Wednesday to a total of over 143,000 after climbing 1,141 on Tuesday, according to a Reuters tally.

This is the first time the US reported back-to-back days with over 1,100 lives lost since late May.

Total COVID-19 cases are also nearing 4 million, as some 3,970,901 have so far been infected with the virus across the US, according to Johns Hopkins University data.

Total number of deaths also reached 143,187.

The tally is led by Texas, which reported a record 197 new deaths on Wednesday.

Bodies in refrigerated trucks

That has forced authorities in one hard-hit Texas county to store bodies in refrigerated trucks as they ran out of space in their morgues.

The county, Hidalgo County, at the southern tip of the state on the US border with Mexico, has seen cases rise 60% in the last week, with deaths doubling to more than 360.

The last time Texas exceeded 197 new deaths was in mid-May.

US health authorities called for new stay-at-home orders as some 10,893 cases were recorded in the state on Wednesday.

The number of cases has risen 60 percent in the last week in the state, according to a Reuters tally, with deaths doubling to more than 360.

Alabama also reported a new single-day high in its fatalities, 57, and six other states reported at least 50 new deaths from COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.

California overtakes New York in COVID-19 cases

In the meantime, California surpassed New York in the number of cases, as its registered 12,112 new cases on Wednesday.

The figure took the total tally to more than 421,000 in the state, according to a Reuters tally of county data.

The death toll in the state also set a one-day record, rising by 159.

California, the most populous state in the US, now stands in fourth place in the country with nearly 8,000 deaths.

New York, the original epicenter of the disease in US, has now managed to get the epidemic under control. It has reported the fewest hospitalizations in four months this week and only two deaths on Tuesday.

So far, New York recorded the most deaths of any US state at over 32,000.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump’s refusal to his refusal to share the stage with scientific experts -- or the facts has resurfaced as the November election draws near.

Trump’s approach to managing the coronavirus -- that tends to put his own political interests ahead of science-based reasoning -- extends to reopening schools, which he wants to do so that the country will look like it’s back to some semblance of normality ahead of the November vote, CNN said.

Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor University said, Trump wants to open the schools, regardless of what the science says. And the science is pretty clear. If you open schools in areas or school districts where there’s a high level of virus transmissions, say if you were going to do this in Houston today or San Antonio or Phoenix, it will fail.

SOURCE: PRESS TV