The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention explained that Texas began providing information on possible cases of infection on December 18
The US federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has adjusted its system for counting confirmed and potential coronavirus cases in the country in a 24-hour period. The new estimates were presented on Saturday.
According to the data, the total number of cases reported has increased by 403,359 in the past 24 hours, to 17,391,270 since the start of the pandemic. The jump was due to the CDC taking new data from the state of Texas into account when calculating the figure.
As the centres explained, “Texas began providing information on possible cases [of the coronavirus] on 18 December. Previously, only confirmed cases from Texas were taken into account in calculating the total. It is up to state authorities to decide which information to provide to the CDC. Not all states disseminate information about potential cases.
The data Texas has provided includes information on 171,505 new possible cases. According to the CDC website, without this new information from the state on potential cases, the total would have increased by 231,854 in the past 24 hours.