EXCLUSIVE: Top CDC official warns New York's coronavirus outbreak is just a preview
Being a responsible American--means staying AWAY from others --not working for now. Period!!
EXCLUSIVE: Top CDC official warns New York's coronavirus outbreak is just a preview
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/489684-exclusive-top-cdc-official-warns-new-yorks-coronavirus-outbreak-is-just-a
By Reid Wilson - 03/26/20 01:50 PM EDT
American health officials are deeply concerned that the coronavirus outbreak that has overwhelmed New York City hospitals in recent days is just the first in a wave of local outbreaks likely to strike cities across the country in the coming weeks.
In an exclusive interview, Dr. Anne Schuchat, the principal deputy director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said her agency is seeing early signs that the number of cases in other cities are already beginning to spike. While New York City is home to almost half the cases in the country at the moment, other cities are seeing their case counts rising at alarming rates.
“We're looking at our flu syndromic data, our respiratory illness that presents at emergency departments. Across the country there's a number of areas that are escalating. The numbers in New York are so large that they show up, but we're looking at increases over time and we're really seeing some in a number of places. It would be surprising to me based on what I've seen about how this virus spreads if it were not going to increase in many other parts of the country,” Schuchat said.
The CDC has deployed about 1,500 of its epidemiologists, scientists and experts to hot spots around the country, including the New York City area and Seattle, where the first American cases of the coronavirus emerged in January and early February. Now, Schuchat said, the CDC has dispatched teams to Louisiana, Wisconsin and Colorado, among others.
Schuchat declined to name the cities that are likely to become the epicenters of new and worrying outbreaks, but New Orleans has stood out in recent days for the rapid growth in cases it has seen. Louisiana reported its first case of coronavirus on March 9; it crossed 100 cases a week later. Its case count doubled between Sunday and Wednesday, when the state reported almost 1,800 cases.
Gov. John Bel Edwards (D) said Tuesday that the pace of growth in the number of confirmed cases in Louisiana was on par with countries like Italy and Spain, two of the hardest-hit nations in Europe where health systems have quickly become overwhelmed and doctors are having to make gut-wrenching decisions about rationing care.
Colorado reported nearly a thousand cases of the coronavirus on Thursday, twice as many as it had confirmed on Sunday. Wisconsin's case load had grown from 385 on Sunday to 585 on Thursday..................................................................................
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