Contact tracers at work in Houston on Wednesday. The Texas Department of State Health Services said the state’s Covid-19 death toll stood at 4,348.
Photo: adrees latif/ReutersTotal coronavirus cases in the U.S. approached four million, while state governments and federal health officials rolled out measures aimed at curbing the virus’s spread.
Texas reported 197 additional deaths Wednesday, a single-day record, bringing its total to 4,348 dead, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services.
The nation’s overall death toll topped 143,000, and new cases surged by more than 71,000, the sharpest daily rise since July 16, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Source: Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering
Source: Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering
Higher case counts are attributable in part to a rapid expansion of testing across the country, while a patchwork of rules and regulations, differing across states and localities, has contributed to a resurgence of new cases. Epidemiologists say a consistent, national approach is more effective.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, announced statewide mandates requiring the wearing of face masks in stores, public buildings and other indoor spaces where people gather.
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Mr. DeWine said the state recommends that individuals traveling from states with a positivity rate of 15% or above self-quarantine for 14 days. “We’ve got to get this virus under control—wearing masks is going to make a difference,” he said.
The District of Columbia and more than half the states in the U.S. have mandates for face coverings, according to the National Governors Association and an order issued Wednesday by Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser.
Sources: Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering; the Lancet; Associated Press; U.S. Census
Asked about the new rules in Washington, D.C., President Trump said Wednesday he would make a decision in the next 24 hours on whether federal property in the nation’s capital should follow suit.
In an effort to help protect nursing homes, whose residents account for a big portion of Covid-19 deaths, federal health regulators will mandate weekly testing of staffers in states with high rates of coronavirus infections. The new requirement was announced Wednesday but will only take effect after the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issues a formal rule.
It would represent the agency’s first official mandate for testing in nursing homes, researchers said, bolstering a CMS recommendation that nursing homes perform testing of residents and staff as they moved toward reopening to visitors.
Senate Republicans, meanwhile, prepared to roll out their opening offer for a fifth coronavirus relief package after ironing out differences with the White House, setting up negotiations with Democrats ahead of the expiration of enhanced unemployment benefits.
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The plan will include $16 billion in new funding for testing. More than $100 billion will go toward schools, with some of that money only available to K-12 schools that plan to physically reopen. It wasn’t immediately known if a payroll-tax cut would be included in the GOP plan.
Other countries around the world continued to struggle with outbreaks, as the global number of cases passed 15.2 million, according to Johns Hopkins.
India reported a record single-day jump in coronavirus infections, with 45,720 new cases, taking the total number to more than 1.2 million, according to the country’s Health Ministry. India’s death toll rose by 1,129 to 29,861.
In the Middle East, governments in the Arab Gulf are taking different approaches to the pandemic ahead of a religious holiday beginning Saturday. Oman, currently suffering the Gulf region’s worst outbreak, will impose an evening curfew for two weeks and ban travel between provinces. Authorities in the United Arab Emirates have encouraged people to pray at home to mark the Eid al-Adha holiday. Mosques, currently allowed to operate at 30% capacity, can increase to 50% only after the holiday ends.
In Saudi Arabia, where the annual hajj pilgrimage has been severely curtailed, a few thousand Saudi nationals and foreign residents who have been selected to participate will enter isolation this weekend before performing the rites next week.
Japan said Thursday that a total of 796 cases were reported nationwide on Wednesday, breaking the daily record set in April. However, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said a travel-promotion campaign would go forward, and he called for talks with nations including China and South Korea about resuming some business travel.
South Korea reported 59 cases, bringing the total to 13,938. Of the total daily cases, 39 were local infections, the highest number in 18 days.
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Australia’s southeastern Victoria state reported 403 new cases and five deaths, while New South Wales, home to Sydney, reported 19 more cases. The federal government said it would post its largest annual deficit since World War II as it rolls out hundreds of billions of dollars in stimulus to support the economy.
China’s health authorities reported 21 locally transmitted cases. Of those, 18 were in the far-western region of Xinjiang, while the others were linked to a seafood-processing plant in Liaoning province in northeastern China, according to the country’s state broadcaster. Such products have raised alarm in China over the past few months. The coronavirus was detected on cutting boards used for imported salmon at a wholesale food market in Beijing, which later became the center of a local outbreak. Several provinces have also detected the virus on packages of shrimp imported from Ecuador, leading to a partial import ban on some seafood from the country.
Elsewhere, Brazil reported 67,860 new cases, a single-day record. The country also reported 1,284 deaths, taking its total to 82,771.
Write to David Hall at david.hall@wsj.com
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