NIAID Director Dr. Anthony Fauci did not sugarcoat the future of the coronavirus crisis in hearings before the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Wednesday.
Said Fauci: “We will see more cases. Things will get worse than they are right now. How much worse they'll get will depend on our ability to do two things. To contain the influx of people who are infected coming from the outside, and the ability to contain and mitigate in our own country. Bottom line, it's going to get worse.”
Fauci also pushed “surveillance” testing, “where you go out into the community and not wait for someone to come in and ask for a test, but you proactively get a test. We are pushing for that.”
Asked how many fatalities there could be from coronavirus, Fauci added, “It is going to be totally dependent upon how we respond to it. So I cannot give you a number. If we are complacent and don't do really aggressive containment and mitigation, the number could go way up and be involved in many millions. If we contain, we could flatten it.”
