Global COVID-19 Deaths Have Surpassed 1 Million

By Nsunjo Erica

According to a tally of cases compiled by Johns Hopkins University, more than 1 million people have died of COVID-19 around the world, and these numbers are alarming to the World Health Organization.

The data compiled by the university indicates that the overall number of cases has breached the 33million-mark and the deaths have increased to 1,000,555.

More than 5,400 people are dying around the world every 24 hours, according to Reuters calculations based on average deaths so far in September.

The Reuters calculations also indicate that around 226 people per hour or one person every 16 seconds die. In the time it takes to watch a 90-minute soccer match, 340 people die on average.

The United States, Brazil, and India are leading to high cases of COVID-19 fatalities accounting for nearly 25% of the deaths. Reports indicate that deaths from COVID-19-related illnesses have also doubled from half a million in just three months.

The United States alone accounts for over 25 percent of COVID-19 deaths and it is the worst-hit country with the world’s highest number of cases and deaths at 7,115,338 and 204,758, respectively.

READ: Global COVID-19 Deaths Shock The World Health Organization

Reports indicate that India comes in the second place in terms of cases at 6, 074,702, while the country’s death toll soared to 95,542.

Additionally, health experts have gone ahead to warn that official and accurate data for both deaths and cases globally could actually be underreported, especially in countries with limited testing capacity.

“If anything, the numbers currently reported probably represent an underestimate of those individuals who have either contracted Covid-19 or died as a cause of it. When you count anything, you can’t count it perfectly but I can assure you that the current numbers are likely an underestimate of the true toll of COVID”, a leading portal quoted Ryan as saying.

The World Health Organization is currently working hand in hand with different countries that are working on the production of the COVID-19 vaccines, meanwhile, the US and China have vaccines in the final stages of the trial.

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Last week, the World Health Organization (WHO) Emergency Director Michael Ryan, the pandemic still had a “long way to burn” and though the proportion of infected people dying had dropped as treatment techniques improved, “we cannot accept 50,000 deaths a week as an acceptable number”.

“We’re adding about 1.8 to two million cases per week to the global case count, and an average somewhere between 40,000 to 50,000 deaths,” Director Michael Ryan told a virtual news conference.

“Thankfully that is not rising exponentially. This is a hugely high figure to be settling. That is not where we want to be.” Michael Ryan added.

“Even though those numbers are flat at a global level that covers up the fact that at regional and sub-regional levels in some countries, we’re seeing significant rises in cases.” More from Michael Ryan