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Dr. Anthony Fauci says staying closed for too long could cause ‘irreparable damage’
By Berkeley Lovelace Jr. of CNBC.
- Stay-at-home
orders intended to curb the spread of the coronavirus could end up
causing “irreparable damage” if imposed for too long, White House health
advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said.
- “I don’t want people to think
that any of us feel that staying locked down for a prolonged period of
time is the way to go,” he told CNBC.
"Stay-at-home orders intended to curb the spread of the coronavirus
could end up causing “irreparable damage” if imposed for too long,
White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci told CNBC on Friday.
“I
don’t want people to think that any of us feel that staying locked down
for a prolonged period of time is the way to go,” Fauci said during an
interview with CNBC’s Meg Tirrell on “Halftime Report.”
He said the U.S. had to institute severe measures because Covid-19
cases were exploding then. “But now is the time, depending upon where
you are and what your situation is, to begin to seriously look at
reopening the economy, reopening the country to try to get back to some
degree of normal.”
However, Fauci also cautioned states against
reducing social distancing measures too quickly, adding they must take
“very significant precautions.”
“In general, I think most of the
country is doing it in a prudent way,” he said. “There are obviously
some situations where people might be jumping over that. I just say
please proceed with caution if you’re going to do that.”
Fauci has
been criticized in recent days by Republicans, including U.S. lawmakers
Rand Paul and Andy Biggs, for making comments appearing to advocate for
keeping some businesses closed longer.
Just last week, Fauci,
director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases,
warned members of Congress that the United States could face even more
“suffering and death” from the coronavirus if some states rush to reopen
businesses too early.
It
could also hinder states “on the road to try to get back to an economic
recovery,” he testified at a hearing before the Senate Committee on
Health, Education, Labor and Pensions on May 12. “It would almost turn
the clock back rather than going forward. That is my major concern.”
The
virus, which emerged in Wuhan, China, less than five months ago, has
infected more than 1.5 million people in the United States, according to
data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. States have started the
process of reopening their economies after being shut down for weeks.
In a separate interview with NPR earlier in the day, Fauci said it was “conceivable” that the U.S. could begin to roll out a coronavirus vaccine by December.
He told CNBC that biotech firm Moderna’s vaccine data, released earlier this week, was very encouraging.
Moderna has been fast-tracking work with the National Institutes of Health to develop a vaccine.
On Monday, the company released data from its phase one human trial on
its potential vaccine, showing all 45 patients enrolled produced
binding antibodies seen at similar levels of people who have recovered
from the virus.
The vaccine produced neutralizing antibodies,
which researchers believe are important to protect against the virus,
for eight of the patients whose data was available so far. Data on
neutralizing antibodies for the remaining patients is expected to come
out later.
“We still have a long way to go obviously,” Fauci said
Friday. “There are so many things that need to be done. We’re going to
go quickly into a phase three trial probably in the beginning of the
summer, sometime in July.”"
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