Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson said the U.S. can not afford to wait until "every vestige" of the coronavirus is gone to reopen the economy.
Carson made his comments Thursday to Fox News' "America's Newsroom."
"We had, going into the (coronavirus shutdown), a very strong economy," he said.
"So what we want to do is maintain that economy: Bridge the gap so that means we're going to have to infuse some federal funds but we want to keep things going so that once the virus problem has been eliminated, we can go back."
Carson noted there does not need to be a waiting period until "every vestige" of the coronavirus is gone.
"Common sense would dictate that if we wait until everything is gone, our economy will be gone also," Carson said. "So we have to recognize that obviously there are risk benefits and risks in everything and we have to weight those things."
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump was set to reveal national guidelines Thursday on when and how the U.S. will start to recover from the economic woes brought on by the coronavirus.