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US prison COVID-19 infections hit 30,000: Study

An inmate reads a book while in the infirmary at Las Colinas Women's Detention Facility in Santee, California on April 22, 2020. (AFP photo)

US jails have reported 30,000 cases of COVID-19 among prisoners and guards, according to a research group.

The data released on Wednesday by the “COVID-19 Behind Bars Project” of the UCLA law school show that there are 21,007 confirmed coronavirus cases and 295 deaths out of the two million people incarcerated nationwide.

The study also has reported 8,754 cases and 34 deaths among the prison staff.

Meanwhile, another report released on Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) shows that a high level of prison staff are infected by the virus.

"Because staff members move between correctional facilities and their communities daily, they might be an important source of virus introduction into facilities," the study said.

‘COVID-19 worse than 9/11, Pearl Harbor’

So far, the COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, has infected more than 1,256,639 and killed over 74,000 across the US.

On Wednesday, US President Donald Trump described the fallout from the pandemic harder than that of Pearl Harbour attack in World War II or the 9/11 attacks.

"We went through the worst attack we've ever had on our country. This is really the worst attack we've ever had," he told reporters at the White House.

"This is worse than Pearl Harbour. This is worse than the World Trade Center," he noted.

Japan’s surprise attack on the Pearl Harbour naval base in 1941, which dragged Washington into World War II, killed 2,403 people.

The September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks also killed about 3,000 people, mostly in the World Trade Center in New York, triggering two decades of US wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries.


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