Trump promises COVID-19 will end soon as US breaks daily record of infections

President Donald Trump has promised his supporters that the COVID-19 pandemic will end soon as the United States reported more than 80,000 new coronavirus infections-- the highest daily tally since the pandemic began.

Trump is on the defensive over his erratic handling of the health crisis, which has killed over 223,000 Americans and cost millions more their jobs.

“We’re going to quickly end this pandemic,” Trump, who has played down the threat since it started, said Friday during a campaign rally in Florida.

“Normal life will fully resume,” he added.

Trump made the remark after his Democratic challenger Joe Biden accused him of giving up on containing the virus.

During a speech in his home city of Wilmington, Delaware, Biden promised that he would sign a comprehensive coronavirus relief bill within the first 10 days of taking office if he was elected president.

“He’s quit on America. He just wants us to grow numb,” he said of Trump. “I’m not going to shut down the economy. I’m not going to shut down the country. I’m going to shut down the virus.”

Trump mocked Biden for suggesting during the final presidential debate Thursday night that the US was heading for a “dark winter.”

He accused the former vice president and his Democratic allies of trying to scare Americans into voting for him by exaggerating the threat of the virus.

US faces half a million COVID-19 deaths by February: Study

A research study has found that more than a half million people in the United States could die from COVID-19 by the end of February next year.

Friday's case count of at least 80,005 surpasses the previous daily record of 77,362 on July 16, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Hospitalizations and daily death tolls are also on the rise across the country. Sixteen states had record one-day increases in new cases on Friday and 11 reported a record number of hospitalizations.

The United States has the most cases of coronavirus infections in the world at 8.5 million and the most fatalities.

Health experts warn that the worst is yet to come.

Researchers at the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation said on Friday the virus could kill more than half a million Americans by the end of February next year.

The study suggested that about 130,000 lives could be saved if everybody wore masks, a personal preventive measure that President Trump has consistently undermined.

With a little over a week until the election, opinion polls show Trump trailing Biden both nationally and in several key battleground states that will decide who becomes president.

Trump dismissed the polls on Friday. “I think we’re leading in a lot of states you don’t know about,” he told reporters at the White House.

More than 52 million Americans have already cast their ballots in early voting. Data show that Democrats have cast roughly 5 million more votes than Republicans so far.

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