While California, Arizona, Texas and Florida are being hit badly by Covid-19 right now, we need to keep an eye on states that border them, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said.
“There are a number of states that are nearby that are really quite vulnerable for the same thing happening, and we certainly want to avoid that,” he said on SiriusXM radio.
These border states are starting to show “a slight increase in the percent positivity” and that this is the sort of thing “that would have you at least put a red flag up to watch them,” Fauci said.
What can border states do? What to do in these situations has been discussed at White House coronavirus task force meetings, according to Fauci. He said measures such as mask wearing, social distancing and handwashing need to be intensified. He also suggested that authorities in those states could do things such as consider shutting down places like bars “before you wind up seeing a really bad spike.”