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More than 20 states have now issued orders requiring people to wear face masks in public as the rate of new coronavirus cases surges to record heights in parts of the United States. The U.S. has recorded more than 1 million coronavirus infections over the past month alone, pushing the number of confirmed cases past the 3 million mark this week. (Chappell, 7/10)

Kaiser Health News: Ex-West Virginia Health Chief Says Cuts Hurt Virus Response 

The former West Virginia public health leader forced out by the governor says decades-old computer systems and cuts to staff over a period of years had made a challenging job even harder during a once-in-a-century pandemic. Republican Gov. Jim Justice demanded Dr. Cathy Slemp’s resignation on June 24. He complained about discrepancies in the number of active cases and accused Slemp of not doing her job. He has refused to elaborate. (Smith and Izaguirre, 7/10)

Mississippi's governor has imposed mandatory use of face masks and limited nonessential gatherings in 13 counties, including those that cover the state's most populous cities, as COVID-19 cases have surged in recent days, causing record hospitalizations. The state's Department of Health reported 1,031 new coronavirus cases and 11 new deaths from the disease on Friday, one day after the State Department of Health Officer, Dr. Thomas Dobbs, said intensive care units in five Mississippi hospitals were full because of the increase in cases. (Neuman, 7/10)

There will be changes next week to public coronavirus testing sites in New Orleans as the city's health department director said recent data shows Orleans Parish is "going in the wrong direction." The state reported 2,642 more coronavirus cases, 25 more deaths and 75 more hospitalizations in its daily noon update Friday. That reported case total, according to an Advocate | Times-Picayune analysis, is one of the largest single-day case totals, excluding backlogs, on record. The record is 2,726 on April 2. (Whitfield, 7/10)

Strict social distancing measures, and eventually mask-wearing, were seen as life-saving tools early on in the coronavirus pandemic, as it tore through the Northeast and officials came to fear the worst. But as daily caseloads and death rates began to fall in the spring, many states in the South and West pushed hard to reopen, egged on by President Trump, despite not meeting White House guidelines for doing so. (Pereira, 7/12)

After revelers celebrated the Fourth of July at a Michigan lake, some started testing positive for Covid-19 -- prompting health officials to warn other party-goers that they might have been infected, too. The Health Department of Northwest Michigan said other health officials in the state reported that several people have tested positive "after attending the festivities at the Torch Lake sandbar over the Fourth of July holiday," the department said Friday. (Jones and Yan, 7/12)

Supplies of personal protective equipment were a major worldwide concern in the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic. Four months after the virus was identified in Maine, the situation has improved. But many health care providers say finding protective equipment is still a struggle, and they worry that if there’s a surge of the disease this fall, there won’t be enough on hand. (Wight, 7/13)

Every hospital leader had the same nightmare in the run-up to this spring’s COVID-19 surge: that a moment would come when the number of patients would overwhelm hospital resources. All had read about the doctors in Italy who, short on lifesaving equipment, had to choose who would live and who would die. But it hasn’t happened here. (Freyer, 7/10)

Georgia officials are racing to expand hospital capacity to cope with soaring numbers of coronavirus cases, unveiling plans Friday to reopen a makeshift medical facility at the sprawling convention center in Atlanta and other efforts to add more beds. Gov. Brian Kemp's office said the temporary hospital at the Georgia World Congress Center, which opened in April and shuttered a month later, will soon be reactivated to relieve healthcare systems struggling with rising numbers of coronavirus patients. (Bluestein, 7/10)

A little more than three weeks ago, officials in Pittsburgh announced a milestone enviable for almost any major city in America: A day had gone by without a single new confirmed case of the coronavirus. It was good news for a city that had seen only a modest outbreak all along, even as the virus raged through places like Philadelphia and New York. That was then. (Robertson and Mervosh, 7/12)

In South Texas, a school district is turning over portable buildings to be used for hospital space. In San Antonio and Austin, concert and convention venues are being prepped as field hospitals. In North Texas, Medical City Healthcare opened more COVID-19 units this week, and Parkland Hospital had to request a disaster assistance team. Texas is entering a dire new phase of the coronavirus epidemic. Hospitalizations for COVID-19 keep climbing to record levels, and the state health department on Friday said it had no prediction for when that will stop. (Morris and Ambrose, 7/10)

Health officials in Nevada reported 845 additional confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Sunday along with one more known death.That pushes the totals to 27,683 positive coronavirus cases around the state with 593 known deaths. (7/12)

Arkansas reported 503 new cases of COVID-19 Sunday and eight additional deaths related to the new coronavirus. State health officials said the total number of confirmed cases climbed to 28,367. The death toll for the outbreak, which officials began tracking in early March, was 321 Sunday. (7/12)

South Dakota on Saturday recorded two more deaths from COVID-19 a day after state health officials reported a record number of deaths from the virus. (7/11)

The Missouri Department of Heath and Senior Services is reporting 310 more confirmed cases of COVID-19, bringing the total to 27,443.The state on Sunday also reported five more deaths, bringing the total to 1,069. (7/12)

Michigan reported hundreds of new coronavirus cases Sunday, but the number was down from a day earlier. The state health department also reported one COVID-19 death, pushing the total since March to 6,068. More are probable but haven’t been officially counted yet. (7/12)

The number of coronavirus cases in Iowa is now over 35,000.The Iowa Department of Public Health said the number of cases of COVID-19 grew to 35,002 at 10 a.m. Sunday. That is 503 higher than Saturday’s total. (7/12)

Los Angeles County continued to report a surge in coronavirus cases Sunday, tallying 3,322 new cases of the virus and 18 related deaths.With that, the county has now recorded a total of more than 133,700 cases and 3,800 deaths. (Wigglesworth, 7/12)