Washington D.C., USA - Feb 22, 2021 (CCTV - No access Chinese mainland)
1. Church exterior
2. Local residents mourning outside church
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Kelly, local physician assistant (full name not given) (partially overlaid with shot 4):
"It's absolutely heartbreaking. I'm a PA. You know, a PA in the United States can do a lot of what a doctor does, so I'm in the medical field. So it's impacting my patients by getting COVID-19 or also really severe depression. And (for) patients who had live-threatening illnesses, you know, I've had to be medivaced because they didn't want to go to the hospital and get COVID-19. I also worked as a contact tracer where I was calling everybody to tell them that their test was positive."

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FILE: Chicago, USA - May 2020 (CGTN - No access Chinese mainland)
4. Various of medical workers giving CPR to patient
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Washington D.C., USA - Feb 22, 2021 (CCTV - No access Chinese mainland)
5. Various of local residents outside church
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Kacey, local resident (full name not given) (starting with shot 5):
"My chest is pretty tight. I think, you know, a lot of it comes from our policies obviously, and you know, what's happening. But I think, individually, we all can take simple steps just being more vigilant and careful in what we do."
7. Various of local residents outside church
8. SOUNDBITE (English) David, local resident (full name not given) (partially overlaid with shot 9):
"There are a lot of reasons to feel hope, and already cases are going down because of the vaccine, or for other reasons, and I feel great about that. There will probably be another pandemic certainly in my life time, perhaps quite soon, and we are going to have to deal with the same issues. It's pretty clear to me that we are not at all set up as a nation to handle the issue and we're not a nation that learns from our mistakes either."

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FILE: Los Angeles, California, USA - Dec 2020 (CCTV - No access Chinese mainland)
9. Various of ambulance in front of hospital
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Washington D.C., USA - Feb 18, 2021 (CCTV - No access Chinese mainland)
10. Icy road, garbage on roadside
11. Pedestrian crossing road

Washington D.C., USA - Feb 22, 2021 (CCTV - No access Chinese mainland)
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Kelly, local physician assistant (full name not given):
"I think we have to all be on the same team. We can't be fighting with each other on different teams, one country against the other, one political party against the other. We are all in this together. And that's a spiritual thing. We have to learn from this. We have to learn how to work together to solve this kind of problem. You can't solve a pandemic on your own. One person can't solve it, ten people can't solve it, one country can't solve it. The whole globe needs to come together as one people to solve this."

New York City, USA - Recent (CGTN - No access Chinese mainland)
13. People waiting outside vaccine hub
14. Poster reading "NYC COVID-19 vaccine hub"
15. Various of people waiting in line

A deep grief is looming over the United States, as places across the country hold mourning events for the 500,000 coronavirus deaths on Monday.

The COVID-19 fatalities of the U.S. had reached 500,172 while the national case count rose to 28,184,218 as of 18:23 Eastern Standard Time (EST) on Monday.

In the Washington D.C., people mourned in grim bell rings outside the Cathedral Church of St.Peter and St.Paul over the loss of 500,000 lives, only 34 days after they suffered the similar heartbreaking moment when 400,000 Americans were reported dead amid the COVID-19 circulation.

"It's absolutely heartbreaking. I'm a PA. You know, a PA in the United States can do a lot of what a doctor does. So I'm in the medical field. So it's impacting my patients by getting COVID-19 or also really severe depression. And (for) patients who had live-threatening illnesses, you know, I've had to be medicated because they didn't want to go to the hospital and get COVID-19. I also worked as a contact tracer where I was calling everybody to tell them that their test was positive," said a local physician assistant.

Over the past year since the COVID-19 outbreak, Americans have been left in a dilemma of the virus spread.

"My chest is pretty tight. I think, you know, a lot of it comes from our policies obviously, and you know, what's happening. But I think, individually, we all can take simple steps just being more vigilant and careful in what we do," a local resident said.

Following the ongoing vaccine rollout and decreased daily confirmed cases, American people have sensed a smell of hope yet still fear a resurgence of such public health crisis in the future due to the untangled arguments between the two major political parties.

"There are a lot of reasons to feel hope, and already cases are going down because of the vaccine, or for other reasons, and I feel great about that. There will probably be another pandemic certainly in my life time, perhaps quite soon, and we are going to have to deal with the same issues. It's pretty clear to me that we are not at all set up as a nation to handle the issue and we're not a nation that learns from our mistakes either," another D.C. resident said.

The Americans are longing for a way out of the catastrophe, calling for a collaborative attitude from both domestic and international forces.

"I think we have to all be on the same team. We can't be fighting with each other on different teams, one country against the other, one political party against the other. We are all in this together. And that's a spiritual thing. We have to learn from this. We have to learn how to work together to solve this kind of problem. You can't solve a pandemic on your own. One person can't solve it, ten people can't solve it, one country can't solve it. The whole globe needs to come together as one people to solve this," said the medical worker.

U.S. President Joe Biden observed a moment of silence on the same day to commemorate the "grim milestone" of 500,000 deaths from COVID-19, urging Americans to set aside partisan differences and fight the pandemic together.

The newly-inaugurated president held a candle-lighting ceremony at the White House and ordered American flags lowered at federal buildings for the next five days.

The U.S. toll is by far the highest reported in the world, accounting for 20 percent of the nearly 2.5 million coronavirus deaths globally, an outsized figure given that the nation accounts for just four percent of the world's population. Despite the rollout of vaccines since mid-December, a closely watched model from the University of Washington projects more than 589,000 dead by June 1.

Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, First Lady Jill Biden and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff marked a moment of silence at 18:15 local time at the White House after the president's remarks.

The president called on Americans to remain vigilant in fighting the pandemic by continuing to wear marks, observe social distancing and receive vaccinations when it was their turn.