us US death toll overtakes Italy as world's highest The United States now has now overtaken Italy to have the highest death toll from coronavirus in the world. The latest data, compiled by Johns Hopkins University, shows more than 20,000 people in the US have now died. The grim milestone comes shortly after the US became the first nation to record more than 2,000 virus deaths in a single day. The governor of New York Andrew Cuomo said on Saturday the state's death toll appeared to be stabilising. Announcing a 24-hour figure of 783 new deaths, he noted the last several days had seen around the same number. "That is not an all-time high, and you can see that the number is somewhat stabilising but it is stabilising at a horrific rate," Mr Cuomo said. "These are just incredible numbers depicting incredible loss and pain." New York state has become the epicentre of the outbreak in the US, recording more than 180,000 of the country's estimated 520,000 cases. Bay Area New signs suggest coronavirus was in California far earlier than anyone knew SACRAMENTO — A man found dead in his house in early March. A woman who fell sick in mid-February and later died. These early COVID-19 deaths in the San Francisco Bay Area suggest that the novel coronavirus had established itself in the community long before health officials started looking for it. The lag time has had dire consequences, allowing the virus to spread unchecked before social distancing rules went into effect. “The virus was freewheeling in our community and probably has been here for quite some time,” Dr. Jeff Smith, a physician who is the chief executive of Santa Clara County government, told county leaders in a recent briefing. How long? A study out of Stanford suggests a dramatic viral surge in February.

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