The pandemic total topped 7.5 million cases today, with COVID-19 totals surging in low- and middle-income countries and those that are past their peaks working, with mixed success, to keep illness levels from rising again.The global total today rose to 7,570,801 cases, and 423,155 people have died from their infections, according to the Johns Hopkins online dashboard.Most of world still in first pandemic waveAt a World Health Organization (WHO) media briefing today, Mike Ryan, MD, director of the group's health emergencies program, said most of the world is very much in the throes of the pandemic's first wave, with some slowly making their way out of it.