DOVER — More than 13,000 Delaware workers filed unemployment claims from April 5-11, the Delaware Department of Labor said Thursday.

Nearly 62,000 workers in the First State have sought unemployment benefits over the previous four weeks, a staggering sum that illustrates just how widespread and devastating the coronavirus has been.

After receiving just 473 claims from March 8-14, the state saw 10,720 claims from March 15-21. Delaware announced its first case of COVID-19 March 11 and quickly began closing businesses and limiting public gatherings.

There were 18,987 claims from March 22-28 and another 18,863 the following week, with 13,258 in the most recent seven-day period.

The federal government said Thursday 5.2 million Americans filed for unemployment last week, bringing the total number who have sought those benefits over the past four weeks to around 22 million.

The seasonally adjusted percentage of people on unemployment stood, as of April 4, at 8.2 percent. Per the U.S. Department of Labor, that is an ignominious new record.

To put it a different way, the United States gained about 22.2 million jobs during the decade of the 2010s. In a month, virtually all those gains were destroyed.