“We were confident, our spirits were up after successfully tackling the first wave, but this storm has shaken the nation.”
The second year of the COVID-19 pandemic did not bring a change in terms of new infections: In January most cases are still registered in the USA (6.3 million), followed by Brazil (1.6 million) and – back in the Top 3 again – the UK (1.3 million).
February saw only a slight shift, with the USA and Brazil keeping their top places – with 2.5 million and 1.3 million new cases respectively and France (550 thousand) moving up into the top 3. The numbers of new infections go considerably down in the countries with the fastest vaccination roll-out: the numbers for the US halved and the UK has only a quarter of the numbers from just the month before. Indonesia and Czech Republic are new in the top 10.
In March 2021 the downwards trend for new cases in the USA continues and Brazil moves to first place (2.1 million). The USA is still on second place (1.7 million), India now on third place, after their case numbers tripled compared to the month before. France, Italy, Poland, Turkey, Germany, Ukraine and Russia complete the top 10.
April brought a new variant of the virus, much more infectious, first called India variant, after the country where it first was detected (later changed to Delta variant) and that six-folded the new cases in India to 6.6 million. Runner ups were Brasil and USA, both just under 2 million new cases, followed by Turkey (tripled the new infections to 1.6 million), France, Argentina, Iran, Germany, Poland and Italy.
The highest numbers of deaths were still registered in the Brazil (84,319), followed by India (45,862) and Peru (23,458)
Read more on the chronology of the pandemic in our blog.
