Covid claims 500,000 American lives | First Thing

President Biden held a remembrance ceremony at the White House as the Covid death toll passed half a million yesterday. Plus, Trump's tax returns will be handed to prosecutors

Good morning.

More than 500,000 people in the US have now died from coronavirus, just over a year since the country detected its first case. That is more than the population of Miami, Colorado Springs or Minneapolis. It's also more than the number of Americans who died in the second world war, Korea and Vietnam. In a primetime address to the nation last night, Joe Biden urged people to resist becoming numb to the sorrow", before a holding a moment of silence and candle lighting ceremony at the White House.