Via The New York Times: Live Coronavirus News Updates: Fauci to Testify. Excerpt:
Four of the top health officials in the United States, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, will testify in Congress on Tuesday about the coronavirus, which is spreading with increasing ferocity in at least 30 states.
The hearing by the Senate’s health and education committee was framed as an “update on progress toward safely getting back to work and back to school.” But officials will likely grapple with an inverse idea, as a group of states pause or reverse course on plans to reopen.
The hearing is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. Eastern, and The New York Times will have live coverage.
Dr. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, will be joined by Dr. Robert R. Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Dr. Stephen M. Hahn, the Food and Drug Administration commissioner; and Adm. Brett P. Giroir, the assistant secretary for health.
All four officials also appeared before House lawmakers last week, when Dr. Redfield warned of a potentially crippling second wave of the virus that would coincide with flu season.
In an interview on Monday, Dr. Redfield’s deputy, Dr. Anne Schuchat, had an even more grim assessment of the virus: “This is really the beginning,” she told the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Her comments came not long after Kayleigh McEnany, the White House press secretary, played down the spike in cases, saying, “We’re aware that there are embers that need to be put out.”
Dr. Schuchat also dismissed the idea, promoted earlier this year by President Trump and others, that the heat of summer might slow the infection rate. “In terms of the weather or the season helping us, I don’t think we can count on that,” she said.
With new cases surging in many parts of the country, at least a dozen states and cities are pulling back on reopening plans.
In Arizona, where case counts are soaring, Gov. Doug Ducey paused operations of bars, gyms, movie theaters and water parks for 30 days and banned indoor and outdoor public events or gatherings of 50 or more people.
In Florida, where daily case counts reached records over the weekend, the city of Jacksonville said Monday that face masks would be required in any indoor public place where social distancing was not possible. The city is scheduled to host the Republican National Convention in August.
Case counts have climbed sharply in many of the states that were the first to reopen, including Florida and Texas, which recently forced bars to close again.
