BERNIE SANDERS campaigning (Flickr).

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, once the front-runner for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, announced on Wednesday he was suspending his bid for the White House, clearing the way for former vice president Joe Biden to become the party’s nominee.

“The path forward is virtually impossible,” said Sanders. He referred to Biden as “a very decent man whom I will work with to move our progressive ideas forward.”

Sanders gained an early lead in the race with wins in caucuses in the Midwest, but the tide turned when Biden won a landslide victory in South Carolina and went on to win five of the next six primaries.

Biden was expected to win Wisconsin’s primary on Tuesday but results will likely not be announced until Monday, April 13.

As of today (Wednesday), Biden had a lead of 303 delegates over Sanders (1217 to 914) and a Real Clear Politics average of recent polls showed Democrats backing Biden by 58.7 percent to 33.5 percent for Sanders.

RCP’s average of polls also have Biden leading President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, by 49.8 percent to 43.7 percent.

Some good news amidst bad coronavirus news

While the number of coronavirus cases and deaths continue to rise, there is some hope for an improvement in the state of the pandemic.

According to Johns Hopkins University, there are 1,513,358 coronavirus case confirmed, with 88,415 worldwide as of Wednesday.

The United States leads in total cases by a wide margin with 430,376, followed by Spain (148,200), Italy (139,422), France (113,422) and Germany (113,296). But in total deaths, Italy has the most with 17,669, followed by Spain with 14,792 and the U.S. with 14,700.

However, the Institute for Health Metrics and Education at the University of Washington has revised downward its estimate for fatalities in the U.S. by August from 82,000 to 60,415, ascribing the decrease to public cooperation with social distancing and “stay-at-home” orders.