MORE than 616,000 people flew on Christmas Day despite Covid warnings — as figures suggest the virus has killed one in 1,000 Americans.
The huge passenger numbers were revealed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) after they screened passengers through airport checkpoints nationwide.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had urged people to celebrate and home rather than traveling to loved ones to curb the spread of Covid-19.
But 84.5 million residents were expected to travel around Christmas and New Year by road, rail and planes.
It comes the United States reached a grim milestone today as the death toll surpassed 330,000 out of a population of 328.2million.
That means about 1 in 1,000 Americans have died of Covid.
Fears were also sparked about a highly infectious coronavirus strain — which has been ripping through the UK — is now running rampant in North America.
A couple from Ontario, Canada, has been confirmed to have caught the mutant Covid had no known travel history, exposure to the strain, or contact with high-risk people.
‘HOSPITALS STRUGGLING TO COPE’
Health officials said the new coronavirus strain can spread much easier and more quickly than other detected strains.
Dr. Barbara Yaffe, the province’s Associate Chief Medical Officer of Health said: “This further reinforces the need for Ontarians to stay home as much as possible and continue to follow all public health advice, including the provincewide shutdown measures beginning today.”
Hospitals across the United States are struggling to cope as coronavirus cases continue to surge.
In Dallas County, there were only 17 ICU beds as of Wednesday, the Dallas Morning News reports.
Nationally 119,000 Americans spent Christmas Day in the hospital with Covid as 1,541 more deaths were recorded.
In Los Angeles County, one person is now dying every 10 minutes from the virus.
LA County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer said: “And since many of these deaths are preventable our collective focus should be on doing right to save lives.”
Earlier this week, California became the first state to surpass two million cases as experts feared a further spike caused by Christmas and New Year travelers.
On Christmas, the CDC issued an order mandating that all passengers traveling from the UK to the US to have a negative Covid-19 test.
The testing mandate goes into effect at 7.01pm on December 27.
Health experts have been skeptical that the testing mandate will be enough to halt the virus spread, however, as it can take days after infection for Covid-19 to be detected on tests.
Covid-19 cases continue to climb past 80million worldwide, with more than 1.7million deaths.
