Global coronavirus cases surpass 2.6 million, deaths 1,83,000

Washington: The number of global coronavirus cases has surpassed the 2.6 million mark, while the death toll has increased to over 183,000, according to the Johns Hopkins University.

As of Thursday morning, the overall number of cases across the world stood at 2,627,630, with a total of 183,336 fatalities, the university''s Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed in its latest update.

The US continues to be the worst affected, with 841,556 cases and 46,688 deaths, the highest tallies in the world.

In terms of cases, Spain accounts for the second highest at 208,389, followed by Italy 187,327, France 157,135, Germany 150,648 and the UK 134,638, the tally showed.

Italy currently has the second highest number of deaths in the world at 25,085, followed by Spain 21,717, France 21,340, and the UK 18,100.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump raged about the coverage of CDC Director Robert Redfield's interview with The Washington Post, where the medical expert warned about the dangers of a second wave of the coronavirus.

Trump brought Redfield to the White House podium to repudiate the interview only for the CDC director to confirm the newspaper correctly quoted his warning.

The farce took place at the daily White House press briefing on the coronavirus and was sparked by Redfield telling The Washington Post that a second wave of the coronavirus this winter, combined with flu season, 'will actually be even more difficult than the one we just went through.'

The newspaper ran the interview under the headline: 'CDC director warns second wave of coronavirus is likely to be even more devastating.' Trump was furious at the coverage of Redfield's comments - several news outlets, including DailyMail.com, wrote stories on the CDC director's warning - calling the articles 'inaccurate.' He snapped at reporters who asked about the warning and whether Redfield was accurately quoted.

The president brought Redfield before the White House press corp to explain what he said in the interview, only for the CDC director to confirm he was accurately quoted. Redfield did say the headline on the Post's story was 'inappropriate.'

'I think it's really important to emphasize what I didn't say,' Redfield said. 'I didn't say this was going to be worse, I said it was going to be more difficult and potentially complicated because we'll have flu and coronavirus circulating at the same time.'

Trump then jumped in to complain his CDC director was misquoted. 'He was totally misquoted. He said they could come together, they didn't talk about that and his whole purpose in making the statement was to get a flu shot so that next fall, we don't have such a big season of flu and we possibly won't,' the president said.

Redfield went on to clarify what he said in his interview with The Post, which was also essentially what he told the newspaper. 'Next fall and winter, we are going to have two viruses circulating and we are going to have to distinguish between which is flu and which is coronavirus - the spirit of the comment that I made is more difficult. It doesn't mean it's impossible, it doesn't mean it's going to be worse, it's just going to be more difficult because we have to distinguish between the two,' he said.

Redfield's warning in the interview with The Post was clear and essentially what he said in the briefing. 'There's a possibility that the assault of the virus on our nation next winter will actually be even more difficult than the one we just went through,' he told the newspaper.

'And when I've said this to others, they kind of put their head back, they don't understand what I mean.'

'We're going to have the flu epidemic and the coronavirus epidemic at the same time,' is what he told The Post.