Prognosis

World Hits Record Daily Covid Cases as Omicron Mars Christmas

  • Cases jump nearly 50% from a month ago as deaths stay stable
  • Infections soar more than two years into the Covid crisis
Healthcare workers treat a patient on the Covid-19 ICU floor of the University of Massachusetts (UMass) Memorial Hospital in Worcester, Massachusetts, U.S., on Dec. 27.Photographer: Allison Dinner/Bloomberg
Lock
This article is for subscribers only.

Global Covid-19 cases hit a daily record on Monday, disrupting the holiday season a year after vaccines first started rolling out and two years after the emergence of the virus that many hoped would be fleeting.

The more than 1.44 million worldwide infections smashed the prior record after factoring out a day in December 2020 when Turkey backdated a significant number of cases. A more conservative gauge -- the seven-day rolling average that smooths out one-time fluctuations and holiday reporting irregularities -- is also at an all-time high, owing to a tidal wave of omicron infections.