The United States reached 50,031 deaths on Friday from Covid-19, with at least 870,468 confirmed cases of the disease, which has led to the house arrest of most of the population and has halted most economic activities to prevent its spread.

According to the count carried out by Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, which collects data from official and private sources, the United States accounts for about 32% of the 2,736,468 cases of coronavirus infection worldwide and has suffered 26% of the 192,135 deaths on the planet.

The death toll from Covid-19 in the United States is close to the number of casualties suffered by this country in the 10 years of the war in Vietnam and is 16 times higher than the number of fatalities caused by the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

New York City, with more than 16,280 fatalities, continues to be considered the epicentre of the disease, as it is the area hardest hit by the pandemic.

President Donald Trump and the governors of a few states have been pushing for the start of a gradual return to economic activities in the past week, while health authorities warn of the danger of a more rapid increase in the number of cases that could cause an early return to normal.

Several health experts have indicated that official death figures underestimate mortality, as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) only count fatal cases in which laboratory tests have confirmed the presence of the coronavirus, while the health authorities of each state have different methods to count the victims.

For his part, the governor of the state of New York, Andrew Cuomo, indicated that another factor for which the official figures of fatal victims do not reflect the reality is that the authorities only count deaths that occurred in hospitals or residences for the elderly and sick, without taking into account those that occur in homes.