Fauci: Cases may top 100G a day
The nation’s top infectious disease doctor warned that coronavirus cases in the United States could top 100,000 a day if the current spikes in southern states don’t reverse course.
“We are now having 40plus-thousand new cases a day. I would not be surprised if we go up to to 100,000 a day if this does not turn around, and so I am very concerned,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, infectious disease chief at the National Institutes of Health.
Fauci, responding Tuesday to a line of questioning from Sen. Elizabeth Warren during a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing, said, “Clearly we are not in total control right now.”
Fauci cited videos and photos of people congregating in close quarters without masks and said, “We are going to continue to be in a lot of trouble and there’s going to be a lot of hurt if that doesn’t stop.”
Hot spots in the South and West could begin to threaten progress in states that are experiencing positive trends, said Fauci, “We aren’t going in the right direction if you look at the curves of the new cases, so we really have to do something about that quickly.”
Fauci, along with other top health officials including Centers for Disease Control Director Dr. Robert Redfield and Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn, told senators how and when schools and offices could open back up.
“I feel very strongly we need to do whatever we can to get the children back to school,” said Fauci.
The CDC plans to have more guidelines available for local school systems but recommendations for colleges released Tuesday don’t include entry testing for all returning students, faculty and staff.
Senators pressed Redfield and others for more guidelines for schools and offices along with pressure for a national vaccine plan and how to build public confidence in vaccines.
Redfield and Fauci said at least 70% of the population will need to be immune to coronavirus before we start to see herd immunity, and it is still unclear how long immunity could last before needing a booster.
The Food and Drug Administration released guidelines Tuesday saying any vaccine that wins approval will have to be at 50% more effective than a dummy shot in the final, required testing.
Fauci said he’s concerned that, “we get to the hoop (with) a safe and effective vaccine only to find that a substantial proportion of the population do not want to get vaccinated.”
The Trump administration’s “Operation Warp Speed” aims to stockpile hundreds of millions of doses by year’s end, so they could rapidly start vaccinations if and when one is proven to work.