Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Friday he is concerned about the United States entering the fall and winter months with the current level of coronavirus spread.
“Yesterday I just looked at the numbers. It was like 43,000 new cases yesterday,” Fauci told JAMA Editor in Chief Dr. Howard Bauchner in an online conversation. “You don't want to enter into the fall and winter with a community spread at that level, because if you do, you got a difficult situation that's going to be really challenging.”
Fauci noted that many activities will have to take place indoors during the fall and winter months.
“If you look at some of the super spreading type things that have occurred, almost all of them occurred in indoor situations,” he said.
“You're going to have to do a lot of things indoors out of necessity of the temperature, and I'm afraid, with that being the case, if we don't carefully follow the guidelines … the masking, the distance, the crowds, that we may see another surge,” he added.