Around 40 per cent of the people tested positive for COVID-19 in the United States were asymptomatic, according to the country’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The revelation was made on Sunday in the CDC’s latest “COVID-19 Pandemic Planning Scenarios” document.
The document, which the agency said could be used to estimate the possible effects of COVID-19 in the US states and localities, was first posted on May 20.
The latest update is based on data received by the CDC through June 29.
The new percentage of infections that are asymptomatic, under the CDC’s “current best estimate”, is up from the 35 per cent the agency estimated on May 20.
Also, under the agency’s current best estimate, an asymptomatic individual is 75 per cent as infectious as a symptomatic individual.
“Asymptomatic cases are challenging to identify because individuals do not know they are infected unless they are tested, which is typically only done systematically as a part of a scientific study,” the CDC added.
The United States has witnessed a sudden surge in the number of coronavirus cases, especially in states namely California, Texas, Arizona and Florida.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the country currently accounts for the world’s highest number of infections and fatalities at 3,770,012 and 142,064 respectively.
The coronavirus is simply spreading into new populations in the US.
Meanwhile, India saw yet another big single-day jump of more than 34 thousands COVID-19 cases, pushing its tally to 1040457 on Saturday, while the death toll climbed to 26285 with 676 people succumbing to the infection, according to the Union Health Ministry data.
The number of recoveries stands at 654078, while there are 359701 active cases of coronavirus infection presently in the country and one person has migrated, the updated data at 8 am showed.
According to the ICMR, 1,30,72,718 samples had been tested for COVID-19 till July 16, of these 333228 samples were tested on Thursday
