Irans president says an estimated 25 million people in the country could be infected with the coronavirus, way above the countrys official rate, as the World Health Organization reported a record daily increase of new cases of more 270,000.

Hassan Rouhani told a summit of the countrys coronavirus taskforce on Saturday that the health ministry estimated about 25 million Iranians might have contracted the virus and warned up to 35 million more might become infected in the months ahead.

The method by which the figure was derived was not disclosed, but the estimate gave an insight into the scale of the outbreak in the worst-hit country in the Middle East, with 270,000 confirmed cases and at least 13,979 deaths.

Rouhanis deputy head of communications, Alireza Moezi, added on Twitter that the 25-million estimate referred to those who have encountered the virus and achieved complete immunity.

We have to consider the possibility that 30 to 35 million more may face infection, Rouhani told a televised meeting of the task-force. We have not yet achieved herd immunity and we have no choice but to be united and break the chain of transmission of the coronavirus.

Iran refrained from fully locking down its population of 81 million but closed schools, cancelled public gatherings and banned movement between provinces in March. It lifted most of the restrictions a month later to relieve the impact of the closures on its ailing economy.

Australia postponed the next sitting of its national parliament as cases continued to surge in and around its second-largest city, Melbourne. A second lockdown has been imposed on the southern state of Victoria, weeks after the initial wave of restrictions was lifted and community transmission briefly appeared to have been eradicated.

The national body will be suspended for two weeks to account for the risk of politicians in Victoria spreading the virus to the capital, Canberra, and the surrounding state of New South Wales, the Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, said on Saturday.

The risks posed by a parliamentary sitting are significantly higher and unlikely to be resolved in the next month, he said.

As the global count of cases being tracked by Johns Hopkins University crossed 14m, with nearly 600,000 deaths, France announced that masks would be made mandatory in enclosed public spaces including banks, shops and indoor markets starting on Monday.

The reproduction rate of the virus in the Brittany region has risen sharply in the past weeks, raising fears the virus may be regaining momentum in the country.

The WHO reported the greatest daily increase in global cases, with the total rising by 237,743 in the 24 hours to Saturday. The biggest increases were reported in the US, Brazil, India and South Africa.

Cases in the US grew by more than 76,000, a record for the worlds worst-hit country.

In a lecture for the Nelson Mandela Foundation, delivered online, the UN secretary-general Antnio Guterres said the pandemic had revealed, like an x-ray, fractures in the fragile skeleton of the societies we have built.

It is exposing fallacies and falsehoods everywhere: the lie that free markets can deliver healthcare for all; the fiction that unpaid care work is not work; the delusion that we live in a post-racist world; the myth that we are all in the same boat, said Guterres, a former Socialist prime minister of Portugal.

He added that the coronavirus outbreak had created a generational opportunity to build a more equal, sustainable world. Because while we are all floating on the same sea, its clear that some are in superyachts while others are clinging to the floating debris, Guterres said.

The UN has appealed for $10.3bn (8.2bn) to help poor states, but has received only $1.7bn.

China launched mass health screenings in the western Xinjiang province after a spike in cases raised fears of a fresh outbreak. Flights into the regional capital rmqi were suspended along with the citys subway services after 17 cases were found on Saturday.

The whole city has entered a wartime state, and will suspend all kinds of group activities, state media quoted an official giving a briefing.

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Global report: WHO reports record daily increase of coronavirus cases - The Guardian

The reopening and relaxing of social distancing restrictions in some states may be contributing to the first noticeable nationwide increase in coronavirus fatalities since April, when the pandemic initially peaked.

The number of cases in late June surged higher than during the outbreaks first peak. At this same time, daily Covid-19 fatalities decreased slightly, leading President Trump to proclaim that deaths were way down. But that divergence may have come to an end last week, when the average number of new deaths per day began steadily rising again.

Where deaths have increased since June 1

Daily new deaths since June 1

States where deaths have increased since June 1

Daily new deaths since June 1, seven-day average

Note: Data as of July 15.

Public health experts have pointed to a few factors that help explain why the death count was initially flat. Treatment has improved and young people, who are less likely to die from Covid-19, make up a larger share of new cases.

Additionally, more widespread testing means cases are caught sooner, on average. That means that the lag between diagnosis and death would be longer than in March, when tests were in critically short supply.

That lag may have come to an end last week, as the number of new deaths began to rise. Many of the states that reopened early are the ones seeing the biggest increases, while New York, the countrys hardest-hit city, has seen a 64 percent drop since June 1.

Deaths in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut

Deaths in rest of the United States

While the growth rate of new deaths has flattened slightly in the past few days, data suggest that the recent increase in deaths may continue. Most of the states seeing the sharpest increase in deaths also have some of the countrys highest positive test rates, as well as soaring hospitalization rates, an indicator that many more residents may be gravely ill.

In addition, a high share of positive tests most likely signals that there are a larger number of people whose infections are going undetected in a states official numbers.

Sources: New York Times database from state and local governments; the Covid-19 Tracking ProjectNote: Data is as of July 15, 2020. States listed above have a minimum of 100 cumulative deaths. Positive test rates are calculated using positive results from July 2 to July 15. Trend lines and new deaths per million show seven-day average data.

Original post:

After the Recent Surge in Coronavirus Cases, Deaths Are Now Rising Too - The New York Times

When you mix science and politics, you get politics. With the coronavirus, the United States has proved politics hasnt worked. If we are to fully reopen both the economy and schools safely which can be done we have to return to science.

To understand just how bad things are in the United States and, more important, what can be done about it requires comparison. At this writing, Italy, once the poster child of coronavirus devastation and with a population twice that of Texas, has recently averaged about 200 new cases a day when Texas has had over 9,000. Germany, with a population four times that of Florida, has had fewer than 400 new cases a day. On Sunday, Florida reported over 15,300, the highest single-day total of any state.

The White House says the country has to learn to live with the virus. Thats one thing if new cases occurred at the rates in Italy or Germany, not to mention South Korea or Australia or Vietnam (which so far has zero deaths). Its another thing when the United States has the highest growth rate of new cases in the world, ahead even of Brazil.

Italy, Germany and dozens of other countries have reopened almost entirely, and they had every reason to do so. They all took the virus seriously and acted decisively, and they continue to: Australia just issued fines totaling $18,000 because too many people attended a birthday party in someones home.

In the United States, public health experts were virtually unanimous that replicating European success required, first, maintaining the shutdown until we achieved a steep downward slope in cases; second, getting widespread compliance with public health advice; and third, creating a work force of at least 100,000 some experts felt 300,000 were needed to test, trace and isolate cases. Nationally we came nowhere near any of those goals, although some states did and are now reopening carefully and safely. Other states fell far short but reopened anyway. We now see the results.

While New York City just recorded its first day in months without a Covid-19 death, the pandemic is growing across 39 states. In Miami-Dade County in Florida, six hospitals have reached capacity. In Houston, where one of the countrys worst outbreaks rages, officials have called on the governor to issue a stay-at-home order.

As if explosive growth in too many states isnt bad enough, we are also suffering the same shortages that haunted hospitals in March and April. In New Orleans, testing supplies are so limited that one site started testing at 8 a.m. but had only enough to handle the people lined up by 7:33 a.m.

And testing by itself does little without an infrastructure to not only trace and contact potentially infected people but also manage and support those who test positive and are isolated along with those urged to quarantine. Too often this has not been done; in Miami, only 17 percent of those testing positive for the coronavirus had completed questionnaires to help with contact tracing, critical to slowing spread. Many states now have so many cases that contact tracing has become impossible anyway.

Whats the answer?

Social distancing, masks, hand washing and self-quarantine remain crucial. Too little emphasis has been placed on ventilation, which also matters. Ultraviolet lights can be installed in public areas. These things will reduce spread, and President Trump finally wore a mask publicly, which may somewhat depoliticize the issue. But at this point all these things together, even with widespread compliance, can only blunt dangerous trends where they are occurring. The virus is already too widely disseminated for these actions to quickly bend the curve downward.

To reopen schools in the safest way, which may be impossible in some instances, and to get the economy fully back on track, we must get the case counts down to manageable levels down to the levels of European countries. The Trump administrations threat to withhold federal funds from schools that dont reopen wont accomplish that goal. To do that, only decisive action will work in places experiencing explosive growth at the very least, limits even on private gatherings and selective shutdowns that must include not just such obvious places as bars but churches, also a well-documented source of large-scale spread.

Depending on local circumstances, that may prove insufficient; a comprehensive April-like shutdown may be required. This could be on a county-by-county basis, but half-measures will do little more than prevent hospitals from being overrun. Half-measures will leave transmission at a level vastly exceeding those of the many countries that have contained the virus. Half-measures will leave too many Americans not living with the virus but dying from it.

During the 1918 influenza pandemic, almost every city closed down much of its activity. Fear and caring for sick family members did the rest; absenteeism even in war industries exceeded 50 percent and eviscerated the economy. Many cities reopened too soon and had to close a second time sometimes a third time and faced intense resistance. But lives were saved.

Had we done it right the first time, wed be operating at near 100 percent now, schools would be preparing for a nearly normal school year, football teams would be preparing to practice and tens of thousands of Americans would not have died.

This is our second chance. We wont get a third. If we dont get the growth of this pandemic under control now, in a few months, when the weather turns cold and forces people to spend more time indoors, we could face a disaster that dwarfs the situation today.

John M. Barry is a professor at the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine and the author of The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. Wed like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And heres our email: letters@nytimes.com.

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A Shutdown May Be Needed to Stop the Coronavirus - The New York Times

I feel like the party line has always been that everybody should decide, not slide into cohabitation, said Alexandra Solomon, a clinical assistant professor of psychology at Northwestern University and the instructor of Northwesterns Marriage 101 course. What I have realized with the quarantine is what a privileged position that is. Its a privilege to make very mindful, thoughtful, intentional choices about when to move in together.

Of course, involuntary home confinement and financial strain against the backdrop of a global health crisis do not add up to domestic bliss for everyone. Joel Velez, 42, was quarantined in Florida with his wife of 18 years and their four children for about a month before he lost his job, for which he worked nights, in a layoff.

For the first time in years, Mr. Velez and his wife were on similar schedules, but their new abundance of time together confirmed something hed suspected for a while. We seem to have lost any kind of common ground besides, you know, where we live and our kids, he said. Last month, Mr. Velez suggested they see a counselor. According to Mr. Velez, his wife suggested they split up instead.

Mr. Velez wondered aloud whether, if the pandemic had never happened, his marriage might have limped along for another 15 years, neither party ever rising to the task of asking for a change.

This whole quarantine situation has forced us to face the problems that weve been experiencing, he said. To stop hiding from each other through work, or through our different schedules.

Robert Falconer, 29, and Julie Fisher, 28, live in Calgary, Alberta, and when their city began to shut down, they, too, had to immediately address a matter theyd been putting off: They had been talking about getting engaged, but there was always just a little too much going on in their lives.

In mid-March, Mr. Falconers parents, who were living in Asia, decided to come and live with him. Mr. Falconer and Ms. Fisher realized they would have to forgo seeing each other in person for a while to minimize exposure risks for their families. All at once, they had to choose: throw together a proposal straightaway, or wait until they could be together in person again, whenever that might be.

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What the Coronavirus Brought Relationships: Clarity - The New York Times

India has become the third country to record more than 1m coronavirus infections, following the US and Brazil, as it reported 34,956 new cases in the past 24 hours, taking the national total to 1,003,832.

New peaks continue to appear around the world, including an alarming rise in the Brittany region of France.

Amid evidence that the disease was taking hold in poorer, rural areas of India with less effective public healthcare, the latest tally prompted renewed concerns about the countrys ability to cope with rising infections.

The figures have been released after a week in which authorities in India were forced to impose new lockdowns, including fresh restrictions on 128 million people in the state of Bihar, which came into force on Thursday.

The continuing and escalating outbreaks, on top of record cases in the United States which passed 75,000 daily cases in the last count have dampened hopes that the pandemic is anywhere close to being brought under control, even as researchers race to find a viable vaccine.

Three states in India Maharashtra, Delhi and Tamil Nadu account for more than half of the total cases in the country so far. Ashish Jha, the director of the Harvard Global Health Institute, warned that the majority of cases in the country were still being missed.

The continuing rise has forced authorities to reinstate lockdowns in some cities and states.

In Bangalore, the government ordered a week-long lockdown that began on Tuesday evening after a rapid rise in cases.

Dr Anant Bhan, a global health researcher, said India was likely to experience a series of peaks as the virus spread in rural areas. He said the capital, New Delhi, and the financial capital, Mumbai, had already recorded surges, while infections have now shifted to smaller cities.

Indias response to the virus was initially sluggish, but on 24 March the prime minister, Narendra Modi, imposed a three-week nationwide lockdown of its 1.3-billion population.

By Friday more than 13.8m infections had been confirmed worldwide and nearly 590,000 people had died, according to Johns Hopkins University, with Brazil recording more than 2m infections by the end of the week and the US more than 3m.

Countries around the world have moved quickly to reintroduce restrictions as outbreaks flare up again. Ada Colau, the mayor of Barcelona, Spains second largest city, announced a ban on gatherings of more than 10 people from Saturday as part of a package of measures to curb an increase in coronavirus cases in the Catalan capital.

We have to avoid gatherings of more than 10 people Only 10 people will be allowed in weddings and funerals from Saturday, Colau told a press conference. Residents were urged to shop online and cultural and sports events will also be limited.

In France, which had already announced plans to make mask wearing mandatory in enclosed public spaces, authorities reported a sharp rise in the infection rate in Brittany. According to data released on Friday, the diseases reproduction rate in Brittany had risen from 0.92 to 2.62 between 10-14 July.

Its a worrying number because it means the epidemic is taking off again, Eric Caumes, an infectious disease specialist at the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital in Paris, told BFM TV.

In China, flights into the city of rmqi in the far-western Xinjiang region were restricted on Friday, and underground and public bus services suspended, according to local social media.

The latest outbreak has underlined the continuing difficulty China faces in stamping out the virus even with its imposition of draconian measures which first emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year.

Amid fears around the world over the ease in which new resurgences have escalated after countries relaxed restrictions, Hong Kong reported 50 new locally transmitted cases on Friday, stoking further concern about a third peak of infections in the global financial hub.

Tokyo hit a daily high of 293 infections as Japan tried to keep the worlds third-largest economy running while curbing infections, a precarious balancing act of opening restaurants and theatres with limited seating, and having store clerks work behind plastic shielding.

We have asked people and businesses to raise their alert levels, said Tokyos governor, Yuriko Koike. She said the recent higher numbers partly reflected more aggressive testing.

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Global report: coronavirus infections in India pass 1m as outbreaks flare globally - The Guardian