Pulitzer Prize-winning science reporter Laurie Garrett on Wednesday issued a stark warning about the continuing coronavirus threat, saying “we are far from being out of the woods on this.”
Garrett, who wrote the 1994 book “The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance,” told MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell that “most of America” seems to have been “lulled into a kind of happy complacency” about the public health crisis that has now killed at least 115,000 people nationwide.
“Nobody likes to be under lockdown. I’m sick and tired of it, right, we all are,” Garrett acknowledged. “But, to have a president just sort of shrug it off and move on to the next topic, as if it was all over, merely is encouraging millions and millions of Americans to believe you can go back outside, you don’t need the mask, you don’t need the gloves and so on.”
“And nothing could be further from the truth,” Garrett continued.
The number of infections have surged in the weeks since Memorial Day, as many states lifted restrictions and allowed businesses to reopen.
“We are far from being out of the woods on this,” Garrett said.
She warned the virus could kill 250,000 in the U.S. by September if infections continue to spread at the same rate as they are now.
