Confirmed infections of COVID-19 in the United States exceeded 750,000 with over 40,000 deaths recorded as of Sunday while federal and state leaders are making an increasingly hard choice between ensuring public health safety and reopening the battered economy.

The United States reported 82,404 confirmed COVID-19 cases as of 6 p.m. U.S. Eastern Time on Thursday (2200 GMT), according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.