Dr. Deborah Birx on Tuesday said that medical experts failed to understand the seriousness of the coronavirus because of incomplete data coming out of China.
“I think the medical community interpreted the Chinese data as that this was serious but smaller than anyone expected,” she said. “Because I think probably we were missing a significant amount of the data.”
Birx spoke about the experts’ relationship with the data during a White House press briefing on Tuesday evening.
She acknowledged frankly that when she saw early data from China reporting only 50,000 cases of the virus among the 20 million people in Wuhan, China, and the 80 million in Hubei province, she felt that the threat was similar to that of SARS, which had 8,098 cases globally and 774 deaths.
US military strikes alleged narco-trafficking vessel in Caribbean, killing 4 ‘narco-terrorists’
Justice Department charges 16 across multiple states with alleged illegal voting, election crimes
Breaking: US Issues Security Alert as Trump Rushes to WH Days After Saying US Could Soon ‘Annihilate’ Iranian Regime
Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn Says His Viral ‘Duct Tape Man’ Encounter Echoes ‘Revelation’ About Evil in His Latest Book
New Jersey mom charged with obstruction after ‘missing’ son found hiding in her crawl space
NORAD F-16 intercepts aircraft that violated restricted airspace over Camp David with Trump present: officials
DSA Democrats Praise This ‘Socialist Model’ – Communist Cuba’s Power Grid Collapses
Watch: MAGA Takes Victory Lap as CNN Is Forced to Read Trump’s WH Ban on Air
Newsom signs bills to prevent Trump from ‘dictatorial control’ over California elections
Shocking Reports of Dog Torture Emerge from Major LA Homeless Encampment
Trump announces new ‘AI Force,’ vows to protect industry as AI czar announcement nears
Solid-Blue Oregon Suddenly Looks Flippable as a New Poll Puts the Governor’s Race in Toss-Up Range
Who is Chinese first lady Peng Liyuan?
Specific Utah Law Could Derail Charlie Kirk Family’s Wrongful Death Case: Legal Experts
Riyadh airport explosion prompts Saudi Arabia to issue air raid alerts as Houthi fighting escalates
The devastation hitting countries like Italy and Spain and South Korea gave the experts much more complete data, helping them draw models that were far more alarming.
“Let’s see if we can do much better than that,” President Donald Trump said during the briefing, pointing to the models predicting 100,000 to 240,000 deaths in the United States.
Trump noted that the virus was also more contagious than expected.
“I think the one thing that nobody really knew about this virus was how contagious it was,” he said. “It’s so incredibly contagious, and nobody knew that.”
Story cited here.
