There is a serial killer roaming among us, and its name is COVID-19.
As of Thursday afternoon, at least 275,000 people have died of this novel coronavirus in the United States since February. The CDC projects that by the end of December, the overall U.S. death toll from this scourge could reach 303,000 on the low end and 329,000 on the high end.
It hasn’t been that long ago – about a month – since we told you the virus about every three days was killing roughly the same number of Americans, about 2,750 people, as were killed on Sept. 11, 2001, during terrorist attacks against our country.
That’s changed now. On Wednesday – just Wednesday – 2,798 people took their last breaths as the virus claimed them. And on Thursday, U.S. virus deaths topped 3,100. Just Thursday. So right now we’re seeing the equivalent of a 9/11 attack every day.
Chattanooga isn’t being spared. Here, on Wednesday, Hamilton County broke five records among the statistics central to measuring the impact of COVID-19 in the community.