COVID-19 cases in USA grow at a speed not seen since June, the start of the summer peak - USA TODAY

At the current rate of growth, the nation could set a record for new COVID-19 cases in a single week within the first few days of November.

Nineteen days from the presidential election, the USA has more confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths than any other country, and cases are growing at a speed not seen since the start of the summer peak.

At the current rate of growth, the nation could set a record for new cases in a single week within the first few days of November, according to a USA TODAY analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. If the spread of cases picks up momentum – as was seen in late June and July – the USA could set a record in little more than a week.

Yesterday, we had about 50,000 new cases," said Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins.

There are nearly 8 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the USA and more than 217,000 people have died, according to Johns Hopkins. The pandemic has touched all but three counties, and the share of positive coronavirus tests is increasing in the Northwest, Midwest and other northern states.

As of Wednesdayevening, 14 states had set records for new cases in a week while four had a record number of deaths in a week.

South Dakota and Montana are also ahead of the summer records, while Wisconsin is not far below, a data visualization of Johns Hopkins University by University of Illinois computer scientist Wade Fagen-Ulmschneider shows. .

Thirty-three states have higher than recommended positivity rates, and more than 30 reported an increase in the percent of tests coming back positive from the week before, according to Johns Hopkins, which notes that the quality of testing varies by state.

New daily cases peaked in the spring in mid-April at a seven-day average of nearly 32,000 cases a day.

"This is a very bad premonition in what we’re seeing in the last week or two in the uptick in cases, and we would be fools to wait until it’s blatantly obvious," Poland said

At the current rate, new daily cases will peak at the end of December, and daily deaths will peak in mid-January, according to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington

Nationwide masking would cut the projected case peak in half, but easing mandates would double it, according to the model