🇪🇺 Europe is once again the epicentre of the COVID-19 pandemic. Of every 100 new infections last reported around the world about 51 were from countries in Europe, which is recording a million new infections about every 4 days.
graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavi… 36 countries in Europe are still at or near the peak of their infection curve and 35 out of the 48 countries @Reuters tracks are seeing their daily reported infection numbers rise.

1/9 How do vaccines protect us against the coronavirus? Once infected, our bodies react and try to fight off the virus, often making us very sick in the process. Vaccines allow humans to build immunity without experiencing illness. tmsnrt.rs/3mI9rDL 2/ These are the six main types of vaccines in the works to build immunity against the coronavirus:

🔥 #wildfires ravaging the U.S. West Coast are sending smoke between continents and up to record heights in the atmosphere. This animation shows the spread of organic carbon since Aug. 13. (Thread - 1/8) This week the smoke has travelled thousands of miles east, turning skies from New York to Washington D.C. hazy and reaching as far as the skies above Britain. On Sep. 16 a thick plume was over Iceland. (2/8)

As the world approaches 30 million reported #coronavirus infections, @Reuters and @ReutersGraphics are launching a new site and extending our commitment to tracking the toll of the global outbreak across 240 countries and territories.

graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavi… It's been 260 days since the first cases of #COVID19 were reported in Wuhan, China. Since then more than 930,000 people have died around the world.

Tracking the virus is as important as ever as some countries confront a second wave of infections. Others, still their first.

Firefighters have been battling some of the largest fires 🔥in California’s history in recent weeks. A fleet of specially equipped firefighting aircraft have been helping fire crews on the ground. Example from Aug. 22 👇
(THREAD) #CalFire has its own fleet of aircraft that can reach most fires within about 20 minutes. The three main components are tactical planes, airtankers and helicopters. All have specific roles but work together as a unit to combat fires.

New COVID-19 cases are rising in Midwestern states partly due to outbreaks linked to colleges and last month’s Sturgis motorcycle rally in South Dakota. New cases in the United States fell slightly, which marked the sixth straight week of declines, but the number of new infections still averaged more than 41,000 a day.

The rate of weekly COVID-19 deaths rose 2% last week, while new cases declined for a fourth week in a row, according to a Reuters tally of state and county reports. tmsnrt.rs/2WTOZDR The United States posted 360,000 new COVID-19 cases last week, down from a peak of over 468,000 in mid-July. The U.S. has more cases and deaths than any other country and accounts for a quarter of the world’s 21 million cases.

In this year's @malofiej awards, @ReutersGraphics picked up 14 medals: 🥇 three gold, 🥈 five silver and 🥉 six bronze. Congratulations to the team!

https://twitter.com/malofiej/status/1290257188611555331

🥇GOLD – Drowning in plastic: Visualizing the world’s addiction to single-use plastic bottles. Around the world, almost 1 million are purchased every minute. The majority end up in the environment, landfill sites, or oceans around the world.
tmsnrt.rs/2PDRvhd

1/6 U.S. gross domestic product plunged at a 32.9% annualized rate in the second quarter of 2020, showing the depth of the coronavirus pandemic’s effect on the health of the American economy. tmsnrt.rs/2CYqZJK 2/6 The current drop is the deepest decline in output since the government started keeping records in 1947, more than triple the previous all-time decline of 10% in the second quarter of 1958.

COVID-19 deaths in the United States rose for a third straight week to more than 6,300 between July 19 and July 26. New cases fell 2%, dropping for the first time in weeks, a Reuters analysis found. tmsnrt.rs/2WTOZDR In Texas, more than 1,000 people died in the last seven days, or 20% of the state’s more than 5,000 total deaths.

The U.S. reported more than 5,200 new deaths from COVID-19 last week and the rate of new deaths rose for the second week in a row, according to a Reuters analysis of @COVID19Tracking data. tmsnrt.rs/2WTOZDR New cases were up nearly 15% from the prior week, and 19 states have reported increases in deaths for at least two straight weeks, including Arizona, Florida and Texas.

Let's talk about 💶 and 📉. 1/€

Starting tomorrow, 🇪🇺 EU member states will meet to agree on the terms of a recovery fund designed to help their economies balance the deficit left by the COVID-19 pandemic.

graphics.reuters.com/EU-RECOVERY/jz… The hole they're trying to fill is... big. Some have even framed this crisis as an existential dilemma for the Eurozone.

1/5 "Deepfakes", or hyper-realistic images of people, can be generated by computers to help build totally untraceable online identities. Here are a few of the hallmarks to detect if the person you see online is real or not. 2/5 When inspected closely, deepfake backgrounds can appear warped and immaterial. Fuzzy, surreal backdrops are an immediate red flag. In this case, the tiles or seams in the wall seem to undulate and dissipate.

1/4 When news broke in June that South Korean pop band BTS and their label donated $1 million to Black Lives Matter, their fans launched the #MatchAMillion campaign and raised another $1 million for the movement – in just over a day. tmsnrt.rs/393dOTG 2/4 K-pop fans have a history of fundraising for charity causes but the scale and speed of the campaign was unprecedented.

1/13 The killing of George Floyd in May sparked worldwide mass protests against racial injustice and brought to the forefront the systemic racism that Black people face on a daily basis. Here are some ways that American inequality plays out in Black lives tmsnrt.rs/38VDcKJ 2/13 Disparities begin at birth, even before. Out of every 100,000 live births, 42 Black women die of pregnancy-related causes, more than three times the rate for white women.

COVID-19 cases in the United States near 3 million as new infections continue to surge. The U.S. saw a 27% increase in new cases last week, according to a Reuters analysis of @COVID19Tracking data. Arizona’s 26% positive rate was the highest in the country followed by Florida, Mississippi and South Carolina.

The United States saw a 46% increase in new COVID-19 cases in the week ended June 28 compared to week prior. Twenty-one states had positive test rates above 5% last week according to a Reuters analysis of @COVID19Tracking data. tmsnrt.rs/38dAEHG The World Health Organization advises governments to keep positive test rates below 5% for at least two weeks before reopening. Arizona’s positive test rate was 24% last week, Florida’s was 16%, and Nevada, South Carolina and Texas’s were all 15%, according to the analysis.

The United States saw a 25% increase in new cases of COVID-19 last week compared to the previous week, as daily new cases approached levels not seen since April. graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAV… Oklahoma, Arizona, Florida and Texas experienced record surges in new infections, according to a Reuters analysis of @COVID19Tracking data.

The rate of new U.S. COVID-19 cases has plateaued at roughly 150,000 per week as declines in early hit states are offset by new cases in the South and Southwest, according to a Reuters analysis of @COVID19Tracking data. graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAV… New cases nearly doubled in Alabama and South Carolina last week. And in Oklahoma, where President Donald Trump plans to hold an indoor campaign rally Saturday, state health officials reported over 1,000 new cases — 68% more than in the previous week.

After five weeks of declines, the number of newly reported COVID-19 cases rose 3% in the U.S. last week, according to a Reuters analysis of @COVID19Tracking data. The Southwest is now a hotspot with Arizona, Utah and New Mexico all posting rises of 40% or more. New cases in Texas and California continue to rise as well.

U.S. police are using a variety of weapons on protesters demonstrating against systemic racism. Most #GeorgeFloydProtests have been peaceful but some have turned violent. Here's a look at anti-protest tactics and how demonstrators are defending themselves. tmsnrt.rs/3eW20Ew Tear gas has been widely and frequently used by police to disperse protesters. It produces a burning sensation in the eyes and mouth that incapacitates.