New York (AFP)

Americans prepare to experience one of the "saddest weeks of their lives," US authorities warned on Sunday, where the new coronavirus continues to cause death, particularly in New State. York.

"Next week will be a time like Pearl Harbor, like September 11, except that it will not be localized, it will be nationwide," warned federal public health administrator Jerome Adams on NBC. .

"It's going to be a bad week" with an "escalation" of macabre balance sheets, added the epidemiologist Anthony Fauci, who advises the White House in the response to the crisis. "We are having trouble controlling" the pandemic, he said.

Despite strict containment measures, the United States, which shelters more than 337,000 cases of Covid-19 and updates their assessment in the same day, has still deplored more than 1,200 deaths in the last 24 hours, one of the most large daily increases, and are now approaching the 10,000 death mark.

"We are starting to see glimmers" of hope, however, said in the evening Vice President Mike Pence who mentioned during a press briefing to the White House an apparent stabilization of new infections.

For President Donald Trump, this is not mutually exclusive. "We all know that we have to reach a certain threshold, which is going to be horrible in terms of deaths, for things to start to change," he said.

There is generally a lag of "two to two and a half weeks" between the slowing down of the number of new cases and that of the deaths, added Dr Fauci, by calling on not to relax vigilance.

- "Under pressure" -

The epicenter of the pandemic, New York alone recorded nearly 600 deaths a day, slightly less than the 630 deaths recorded the day before, but "it is still too early" to draw conclusions, a said Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo.

New York State may be "very close to the peak" of contamination or "this peak may be a plateau and we are on it," he said, cautiously.

In the meantime, the state health system is "under stress" for lack of sufficient equipment and professionals, "he insisted.

Donald Trump announced Saturday the dispatch of a thousand medical doctors and nurses to New York to help cope with the influx of patients.

The 325 first arrivals on Sunday were assigned to public hospitals in New York City, where the situation is most critical, said Cuomo.

The others will be sent to a Manhattan conference center transformed by the army into a gigantic 2,500-bed hospital, Defense Minister Mark Esper said on Sunday.

As for the military hospital ship the Comfort, which is docked in the port of New York like the Mercy in Los Angeles, it will eventually "be open to patients of Covid-19 if it becomes necessary," he said. added.

- "Patchwork" -

Beyond New York, several states are hard hit, like Louisiana, Illinois or Michigan, whose Democratic governors on Sunday called for a federal plan to harmonize preventive measures.

"Having no national strategy for the whole country, but a patchwork that depends on the governors, in my opinion creates a porous situation for the Covid-19," said Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, while nine states, from the center and south, have not adopted containment measures for their population.

"The virus knows no borders," added Illinois Governor Jay Pritzker. "It is up to the federal government to tell all the governors to take containment measures," he added, reproaching President Trump for having been "reluctant" to face these costly measures economically.

These nine states, including Iowa, Arkansas or the two Dakotas, are big producers of foodstuffs "and they are struggling to find the means to continue to feed the country with a cloistered population at home," argued the chief medical officer Jerome Adams.

"But I would like to tell them: give us a month, a week, what you can!", He pleaded. "There is a light at the end of the tunnel, but everyone has to play the game."

© 2020 AFP