Fauci: We Argued ‘Strongly’ with Trump to Extend Social Distancing Guidelines — ‘He Did Listen’

In a Monday interview on CNN’s “New Day,” Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci discussed the newest federal social distancing guidelines amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

Fauci explained the reasoning behind extending the date to April 30, saying the curve has not started to flatten yet.

“When you look at the kinetics of the outbreak, the patterns that are going on now even as we speak, they were not going to reach a peak and turn around the way we wanted to within the time frame that was originally estimated,” Fauci advised. “So, I thought it was prudent and I think the right decision to extend them another 30 days because what you really want to do, you want to start seeing flattening out and turning around of the curve and it coming down. It wasn’t doing that.”

He said the Coronavirus Task Force argued “strongly” with President Donald Trump to extend the date and he listened.

“We felt that if we prematurely pulled back, we would only form an acceleration or a rebound of something which would have put you behind where you were before,” Fauci explained. “And that’s the reason why we argued strongly with the president that he not withdraw those guidelines after 15 days but that he extend them. And he did listen.”

Host John Berman asked how much convincing Trump needed from the task force, to which Fauci replied, “Interestingly, we showed him the data, he looked at the data, and he got it right away.”

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