A nationwide shutdown would bring a 'sense of calm': Fmr. CDC Official

Dr. Rishi Desai, Chief Medical Officer at Osmosis & Fmr. Center for Disease Control and Prevention Epidemic Intelligence Officer, joins Yahoo Finance’s Seana Smith to discuss the coronavirus pandemic as global cases near 1 million.

Video Transcript

SEANA SMITH: Well, turning to the latest on the coronavirus. As it stands right now, more than 5,000 people have died in the US. More than 216,000 people are known to be-- known to be infected at this point. And to put in perspective for you, the death toll has quadrupled over the past week. For more on this, I want to bring in Dr. Rishi Desai, former Epidemic Intelligence Officer for the CDC. And Dr. Desai, thanks for joining us this afternoon. As it stands right now, do you think we have a good handle, just in terms of how many actual cases there are in the US and where the virus on a geographical standpoint might be headed next?

DR RISHI DESAI: No, I don't think we have a good handle. The testing just has gotten to the point where people are able to do things like home testing kits, serology is now coming around. So I think we're about to start getting a sense of the full scale of the problem through testing. But at the moment, we don't have that in place. And so, you know, the numbers you quoted, I think, are better than the ones we had a week ago, but not nearly as good as the ones we'll have a week from now.

SEANA SMITH: It's interesting. I read an op ed this morning by Bill Gates, and he was urging for a nationwide shutdown. We also had Dr. Faucci this morning in an interview with NBC, and he was suggesting the need for one. He didn't go as far as to say it needs to be implemented right now. But what do you think about the need for a nationwide shutdown at this point?

DR RISHI DESAI: I think it would bring a sense of calm, and here's why-- I think the moment you have a shutdown, everybody will recognize that everybody else is doing the right thing. That empowers you to feel like at least, you know, it doesn't feel great to be shut down personally, but you feel like, all right, we're all in this together. And then what's going to happen is, we're going to start seeing that the data is playing this out. Because we're all following the data closely.

As we get more and more reliable testing, we're going to trust the testing data and we're going to trust that that the number of cases is the real number of cases. And as we start isolating, that number of cases will go down over time. And the moment that happens, everybody kind of breathes a sigh of relief that the worst of it is over. And then we have to continue doing all those things, in terms of isolation, but we feel like, all right, at least that half of the problem is solved.

SEANA SMITH: Dr. Desai, do you think the federal government has been too slow in its response to the outbreak so far.?

DR RISHI DESAI: I think that the federal government is doing a number of good things. I think that they can continue to do a number of other things as well. So for example, one area where we haven't talked a lot about is raising the line, specifically in taking care of our frontline health care workers. Getting them PPE-- that is still a problem as of today. And so that's an area where we definitely could have done more and can do more going forward. We also need more frontline health care workers, that's where we need to infuse our frontline with new trainees, get retirees there.

We have done some really positive things. So for example, we have actually relaxed the measures around telemedicine. Good move. We've also done a few other things like, we've actually tried to get companies like GM and Tesla cranking out ventilators. Good move. So there are some good things we've done. I don't want to make it seem like, you know, all is bad and it's all doom and gloom. By far, that's not the case. There are a lot of things that we've done, but we need to do a whole lot more and we need to do it a lot faster than we've been doing it.

DAN HOLLOWAY: Dr. Desai, this is Dan Holloway. I just wanted to ask you a question on the masks. I live about a block from Mt. Sinai in Queens here, and I see a lot of residents walking around with masks. People playing basketball with masks, going out for runs with masks, someone wearing a gas mask, like, literal gas mask at the grocery store. What is, I guess, your recommendation? Should regular people who are healthy, don't have compromised immune systems be wearing these masks or should they allow health care workers to get the first crack at them?

DR RISHI DESAI: So there are different types of masks. Let's start with the fact that N95 masks, which are the ones that really help protect against small particles from getting into your airways, those are in short supply in hospitals. And if you have one, that would be ideal to get over to a health care worker. Those are the folks that need it. Other types of masks, like, you know, you talk about the surgical mask with loops or even a mask you might make at home-- I think increasingly, we're going to see the government's support the use of masks for everybody.

Because here's the thing, a lot of the transmission is happening through asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic people. These are people that are not coughing and sneezing, these are people that are thinking that they're feeling fine and going around and touching their face and their nose and their eyes and then touching objects around, and literally spreading the virus. So when I go to the grocery store and I'm holding a cart, that cart might have been previously used by someone that felt fine but was touching their nose and face and touching the cart, spreading that disease to me.

So by wearing a mask, what it really comes down to is, does that help prevent you from touching your face? And I think overall, the answer is going to be, "yes." Generally speaking, when you have a mask on your face, it prevents you from touching your face. And I think if people see it that way, then they're going to say, OK, I can see that I could have it, I could be spreading it, but with a mask I'm not touching my face. Therefore, I'm spreading it less in the grocery store, the pharmacy, and places like that.

SEANA SMITH: Dr. Desai, thanks so much for cleaning that up because I know there has been a question on a lot of people's minds over the last few days. Thanks so much for taking the time to join us this afternoon.

DR RISHI DESAI: Thank you for inviting me.