December 4, 2020

COVID-19 Is Now America’s Leading Cause of Death

An inmate from an El Paso prison loads a body onto a morgue trailer in November.Mario Tama/Getty

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COVID-19 surpassed heart disease as the leading cause of death in the United States this week, according to a report released Friday by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington.

An average of 1,660 people died of COVID in the US each day in the past week, according to IHME. As Dr. Sanjay Gupta explained on CNN, this exceeded the average number of Americans (10,000 to 11,000) who die each week of cardiac issues. In all, more than 11,600 died from COVID in the past seven days.

Fifteen percent of people in the US have been infected, the report notes. Last week, daily reported cases averaged 165,200, up from 145,900 the week before.

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This is how change happens.

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This investigative reporting takes time too. Months of research. Weeks of writing, editing, and fact checking—and putting together the photography, art, video, and audio that tell the stories in a new way, illuminating new perspectives and voices.

We can afford to take our time because we don’t report to oligarchs or corporations. We report to you, and for you.

And the stakes are high. Democracy is on the defense. We’ve been exposing corruption and scandal for five decades, and this is a pivotal moment in our country’s history. Will democracy prevail? We won’t wait for time to tell—independent journalism is essential for democracy, and we’ll keep doing our part to amplify the free press.

So, we’re asking: Will you join the fight? Mother Jones has been here for 50 years, and we need your support to fuel the future of investigative journalism. Mark our 50th anniversary with a gift of any amount.

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