World Coronavirus Dispatch: Global death toll could be grossly understated

Democrats crafting new $2.4 trn stimulus bill, UK budget deficit hits $222 bn, China's first asymptomatic cases in 35 days and other pandemic-related news across the globe

The world will officially record 1 million deaths from Covid-19 in the next few days, but the real tally might be almost twice that.

Actual fatalities from the pandemic may be closer to 1.8 million -- a toll that could grow to as high as 3 million by the end of the year, according to Alan Lopez, a laureate professor and director of the University of Melbourne’s global burden of disease group. The coronavirus’s rapid spread and ability to transmit in people who show no signs of the disease have enabled it to outrun measures to accurately quantify cases through widespread