Dr. Rochelle Walensky, who was selected to serve as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, speaks during an event at The Queen theater in Wilmington, Del., Tuesday, December 8, 2020.
Susan Walsh | AP
The decline in Covid-19 cases reported in the United States since early January may be flattening, a worrying change, as highly transmissible variants threaten to exacerbate infections, said the head of the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Friday.
“In recent weeks, cases and hospitalizations in the United States have decreased since the beginning of January and deaths have decreased in the past week,” said CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky during a news conference. “But the most recent data suggests that these declines may be stopping, potentially stabilizing at an even very high number.”
The country is now reporting a daily average of about 73,376 new cases last week, a slight increase compared to the previous week, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The US peaked at about 250,000 cases a day in early January, after the winter break.
The recent change could be a sign that new highly transmissible variants of the coronavirus are beginning to establish themselves, said Walensky. A variant, known as B.1.1.7 and found for the first time in the UK, is expected to become the predominant strain in mid-March, experts predicted.
Leading U.S. health officials have warned in recent weeks that the variants could reverse the current downward trend in infections in the U.S. and delay the country’s recovery from the pandemic. Variant B.1.1.7 appears to account for about 10% of new cases of Covid-19 in the United States, up from just 1% a few weeks ago, said Walensky. However, some states have more cases of the highly transmissible variant than others.
Leading U.S. health officials have warned in recent weeks that the variants could reverse the current downward trend in infections in the U.S. and delay the country’s recovery from the pandemic.
The head of the federal health agency said states should not begin to lift restrictions on business and meetings, given the direction of cases and the high level of viral spread.
“I want to be clear: cases, hospital admissions and deaths remain very high and the recent change in the pandemic must be taken very seriously,” said Walensky.
The White House chief medical advisor, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said the country would be in a “precarious position” if new daily cases start to stabilize at around 70,000.
“We have to look carefully at what will happen in the next week or so with these numbers before we begin to make the understandable need to relax under certain restrictions,” said Fauci.
This is a developing story.