WASHINGTON – The top U.S. infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, warned Sunday there is an “extraordinary risk” of the further spread of the ravaging coronavirus if the United States is reopened to business and returned to a sense of normalcy too quickly on May 1, as President Donald Trump is considering.
Fauci told CNN, “It’s not going to be a light switch” to regenerate U.S. commerce as government recommendations for safe distancing between people end on April 30.
He held out hope that “at least in some ways” the country could return to work and routine day-to-day activities next month, but said it is likely to be different in various parts of the country.
That depends, he said, on the number of coronavirus cases in specific communities and whether testing has shown that large majorities of people are not infected.
Even with precautions, he said, “We know people will be getting infected. That’s just reality.”
The U.S. coronavirus death toll has topped 20,000, the highest total of any country, with more than 534,000 confirmed cases. Current U.S. models predict that 60,000 or more could die in the country by July.
Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn told ABC’s “This Week” show, “The models do show that we are very close to the peak,” but cautioned, “This has been a really fast-moving outbreak, so we really have to take this day by day.”
As for the May 1 date, Hahn said, “It is a target and obviously we’re hopeful about that target, but I think it’s just too early to be able to tell that we see light at the end of the tunnel. I think it’s just too early for us to say whether May 1 is that date.”
A third expert also expressed the need for caution in reopening the country.
Dr. Christopher Murray, the director of the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, told CBS’s “Face the Nation” show that the number of coronavirus cases would increase again if the social distancing measures and closures were relaxed May 1.
“We don’t think the capability in the states exists yet to deal with that volume of cases and so by July or August we could be back in the same situation we are in now” if there was premature reopening of the country, Murray said.
