NEW YORK: The coronavirus outbreak could kill 100,000 to 200,000 Americans, the US government’s top infectious-disease expert warned on Sunday as family members described wrenching farewells through hospital windows with dying loved ones.
Faced with that grim projection and the possibility even more could die in the US without measures to keep people away from one another, President Donald Trump extended federal guidelines recommending people stay home for another 30 days until the end of April to prevent the spread of the virus.
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Trump’s extension of the original 15-day guidelines was a stark reversal just days after he said he hoped the economy could restart in about two weeks and came after Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, made the dire prediction of fatalities, adding that millions in the US could become infected.
“We want to make sure that we don’t prematurely think we’re doing so great,” Fauci said of the extension of the federal guidelines.
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By Sunday night, the US had over 140,000 infections and 2,400 deaths, according to the running tally kept by Johns Hopkins University, though the true number of cases is thought to be considerably higher because of testing shortages and mild illnesses that have gone unreported.
Worldwide, more than 720,000 infections were reported, and deaths topped 33,000, half of them in Italy and Spain, where the health system is at the breaking point.
New York state — where the death toll passed 1,000 — remained the epicenter of the US outbreak, with the vast majority of the deaths in New York City. But spikes in infections were recorded around the country, not only in metropolitan areas but in Midwestern towns and Rocky Mountain ski havens. West Virginia reported its first death, leaving only two states — Hawaii and Wyoming — with none linked to the outbreak.
The virus is moving fast