Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and coronavirus task force member, offered some reassurance following the White House’s grim projection of up to 240,000 COVID-19 fatalities, during an interview on CBS Thursday morning.
When asked why we shouldn’t be discouraged by the “frightening” projection, Fauci responded that “it’s within our power to modify those numbers.”
After explaining that the projection is based on a model and that it takes “considerable mitigation” into account, Fauci emphasized the importance of “pushing hard” on those mitigation efforts.
“If you really push hard on mitigation and data comes in that tells you you’re doing better than the model, you can modify the model,” Fauci said.
Fauci then clarified that even though we need to anticipate these “disturbing numbers,” the public shouldn’t feel hopeless because of them.
“We shouldn’t give up and accept and it and say ‘OK, that’s going to happen,'” Fauci said. “We need to push and push with the mitigation to try and get that number lower than the projected number by the model.”
Watch Fauci’s remarks below:
Why should we not be discouraged when we hear such frightening numbers? — @GayleKing
Dr. Fauci: "It's within our power to modify those numbers… if you really push hard on mitigation & data comes in that tells you you're doing better than the model, you can modify the model" pic.twitter.com/SQez0kqQ2J
— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) April 2, 2020
