This is CNN breaking news.

Welcome to the lead. I'm Jake Tapper and we are of course continuing with our coverage of the coronavirus pandemic every day, every hour the situation in the United States becomes even more dire.

The number of deaths in the U.S. still soaring, we are now up to 846.

At this time last week that number was 149 now we're up to almost six times that more than five times that and we could still be a long way away from the worst.

A leading epidemiologist, one advising the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,

has estimated that the peak of deaths in this country will be three weeks from now and if you look at the trajectory on the

graph it's almost too horrible to contemplate what that will mean in three weeks.

Of course confirmed cases continue to surge. Now more than 61,000.

As we've been telling you for weeks the US is seemingly following the Today a top official with the World Health Organization told CNN that even though the US has the potential to eclipse Europe and become the next global epicenter,

quote, there is still time to turn it around, but only if, only if Americans isolate ourselves and only if the government

is able to conduct widespread testing to identify who has it. A glimmer of what passes for good news these days came today in New York.

When Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the rate at which people are being hospitalized in that state is slowing, suggesting to him that social distancing and

other steps the state is taking are working. CNN's Simone Prokiphes is

live for us at New York's Jacob Jabitz Convention Center, which has now been converted into a makeshift

hospital. And Chimon, the numbers Governor Cuomo cited are just projections. So there's no, I mean,

New Yorkers still need to heed caution

Certainly Jake people everyone across the world the nation needs to heed some caution and they need to be careful still there is that piece of good news

that the efforts that are being conducted here in this city in this state all

across the nation is working and they're basing that off of models and predictions that health

officials, state officials have been looking at and what they're finding is

that the rate of hospitalization has somewhat decreased, meaning that when they

looked over the past few days, some of it has decreased.

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