Americans should brace for a "surge upon a surge" in the coronavirus as millions of travelers return home after the Thanksgiving holiday, U.S. top infectious disease expert said Sunday.
"When you have the kind of inflection that we have, it doesn’t all of a sudden turn around like that,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIH), told ABC’s "This Week." "So clearly in the next few weeks, we’re going to have the same sort of thing. And perhaps even two or three weeks down the line ... we may see a surge upon a surge.”
According to The Associated Press (AP), Fauci also appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press,” where he made similar remarks, adding that it's "not too late” for people traveling back home after Thanksgiving to help stop the spread of the virus by wearing masks, staying distant from others and avoiding large groups of people. "So we know we can do something about it, particularly now as we get into the colder season and as we approach the Christmas holidays,” he said.
The number of new COVID-19 cases reported in the United States topped 200,000 for the first time Friday. The highest previous daily count was 196,000 on Nov. 20, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
This coming week, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) will meet with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to discuss a rollout of the vaccine, he said. He added that President-elect Joe Biden should focus on distributing vaccines in an "efficient and equitable way.” Fauci also said he planned to push the new administration for a rigorous testing program.
"We’ve got to go beyond the symptomatic people and get a better understanding of the asymptomatic transmission,” he said.
Health care workers will likely be among the first to get the vaccine, and soon.
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, both said to be safe and perhaps 95% effective, have introduced a much-needed glimmer of hope after months of gloomy news.
"This puts the end to the pandemic. This is the way we get out of the pandemic. The light is at the end of the tunnel," Admiral Brett Giroir, the U.S. official overseeing coronavirus testing, told CNN.