Trump has deferred to the states on when to drop social-distancing restrictions and how to test and rein in the virus. Some governors have similarly deferred to local officials to decide whether to require face coverings and business closures.

As the spread accelerates, the White House said it will hold its first coronavirus task force briefing in almost two months on Friday, led by Vice President Mike Pence. Late Thursday night, Trump tweeted that virus deaths are “way down,” in what appeared to be an attempt to distract from the record case growth. The U.S. economy is “roaring back” and “will NOT be shut down,” he posted.

In Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis said Thursday that he wouldn’t further reopen for now, although he downplayed the significance of the decision, saying he “never anticipated” such a step this soon.

Arizona Governor Doug Ducey said hospitals are likely to hit surge capacity “very soon,” with the number of cases and hospitalizations expected to worsen in the next two weeks. Earlier in the day, the state reported the number of people admitted to hospitals had jumped by 183 to 2,453, the biggest single-day increase since the state began tracking the number.

“This is Arizona’s first wave, and this will not be our last wave,” said Ducey, a Republican who previously had ballyhooed the state’s accelerated reopening.

Residents should wear masks and avoid crowded social gatherings, Ducey said, adding that some people have been “speeding” since the economy began reopening. He said he would focus on education and personal responsibility -- not another executive order.

Breaking Records
Texas added 5,996 cases, the third consecutive day of record-breaking increases, according to state health department data. In all, 131,917 have contracted the disease. The death toll grew by 47 to 2,296, the grimmest day in more than a month. The positive-test rate surged to 11.76%, the highest since April 16.

The center of that health crisis, Houston, sprawls over hundreds of square miles of swampy southeast Texas, a landscape of freeways and shopping malls largely unhindered by zoning. It has a metropolitan area of about 7 million residents who compose one of the most diverse communities in the nation.

Its medical infrastructure will be inundated by Independence Day, according to Hotez. Current trends in Harris County, which includes the city, indicate the caseload will triple or quadruple by mid-July, Hotez said, citing modeling by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s PolicyLab. Such a scenario would be “apocalyptic,” he said. “We can’t go there.”

But Houston’s plan to staff a corps of 300 or more contact tracers has been unsuccessful, in part because of high turnover among recruits, said Stephen Williams, director of the health department. As a result, the city may focus just on patients most likely to have mingled in large crowds.