Coronavirus may become a leading cause of death in the US, according to statisticians. They predict this will be the case before the end of the year.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may not be able to rank leading causes of deaths until the end of 2020 since it requires a full year's worth of data. However, statisticians told CNN that Covid-19 may become a leading cause of death in the US.
"We know that based on the # of COVID-19 deaths so far in 2020, it will end up as a Top 10 leading cause of death but won't know exactly how high it will rank until next year," CDC mortality statisticians said via email Thursday.
"Heart Disease and Cancer, the two leading causes of death in the U.S., account for more than half of all deaths in the U.S. each year and that isn't expected to change.”
Death certificates for the calendar year will become the basis for the final data. In 2018, the latest year for which there is final data, the top 10 leading causes of death among all ages in the US are:
- Heart disease (655,381)
- Cancer (599,274)
- Unintentional injury (167,127)
- Chronic lower respiratory disease (159,486)
- Stroke (147,810)
- Alzheimer's disease (122,019)
- Diabetes (84,946)
- Flu and pneumonia (59,120)
- Nephritis (51,386)
- Suicide (48,344)
Global coronavirus cases
The number of global Covid-19 cases has reached 16.05 million on Sunday afternoon, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
The figure is roughly a quarter of the coronavirus cases in the US with 4,178,730. Johns Hopkins figures showed that the global Covid-19 cases were exactly 16,055,909 with 644,661 deaths.
There has been a continuous rise in case and fatality numbers across the US. Data revealed that the country recorded more than 1,000 daily coronavirus deaths for four straight days as of Saturday. Meanwhile, the total number of coronavirus deaths in the US is currently at 146,463.
Brazil is behind with 2,394,513 confirmed Covid-19 infections, India has 1,385,635, and Russia has 811,073. Brazil recorded the highest death count after the US at 86,449. This is followed by the UK at 45,823, Mexico at 42,645, and Italy at 35,102. India reported 32,060 deaths related to Covid-19 while France recorded 30,195.
Coronavirus vaccine
While the world is waiting for a vaccine that could fight Covid-19, White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said that it may not provide long-term immunity.
“When you look at the history of coronaviruses, the common coronaviruses that cause the common cold, the reports in the literature are that the durability of immunity that’s protective ranges from three to six months to almost always less than a year,” said Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said during an interview with JAMA Editor Howard Bauchner.
“That’s not a lot of durability and protection.”
Dr. Fauci previously said he is “cautiously optimistic” when it comes to finding a coronavirus vaccine that can prove immunity. He said that “there’s never a guarantee.” He is worried “it could take months and months and months to get an answer” before scientists determine whether the vaccine works.
“You can have everything you think that’s in place and you don’t induce the kind of immune response that turns out to be protective and durably protective,” Dr. Fauci said of a vaccine. “So one of the big unknowns is, will it be effective? Given the way the body responds to viruses of this type, I’m cautiously optimistic that we will with one of the candidates get an efficacy signal.”
