For the first time, the coronavirus curve is starting to level in the United States because of a combination of social distancing efforts and the work of the nation's health care providers who are "serving Americans with such dignity and respect" and ensuring they get optimal care, Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator for the White House coronavirus task force, said Friday.
"Our mortality in the United States is significantly less than many of the other countries when you correct them for our population," said Birx, giving the nation's healthcare workers credit for their hard work. "Hopefully you get the theme today that we're incredibly proud of our health workers working together to change the course of this pandemic, working to make the change, and the American public who have really taken all of this to heart and stayed home."
Much of the curve change is being driven by the improvements in New York City, which for a long time marked more than 50% of the country's new cases.
"That is dramatically changed because of the impact of what the citizens of New York and New Jersey and across Connecticut and now Rhode Island are doing," Birx said. "Watching this every day gives us hope across these metro areas from New York and New Jersey and all through Denver and, of course, through New Orleans. We still see cases occurring in the Boston area and in Chicago, but the rate of increase seems to be stabilizing."
However encouraging the numbers are, the peak of the pandemic has not been reached, she emphasized.
"We continue to really applaud the work of California and Washington state and Oregon," she said. "We're learning from all three of those states."
Dr. Anthony Fauci echoed Birx's comments but warned that it's not time to let up on mitigation efforts, particularly in more rural areas.
"If we're going to pull out of this, we have to pull out in the big cities and in the areas that are not as densely populated," said Fauci, while learning from public officials their efforts to fight the disease.
"I think that is an important lesson for all of us on how they did that, what the timing was and in case we ever have to face this issue in the future," said Fauci.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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