Experts See US in 'Free Fall' as COVID-19 Cases Surge in 32 States

Doctors warn, with COVID-19 infections rising in most states and hospital beds becoming scarce, America is heading for disaster. But with the number of crowds who gathered this past weekend to celebrate the Fourth of July, it appears that people have turned a blind eye to the trouble ahead.

"We are in a free fall," said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, chief of infectious diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital, according to CNN. "You see the footage of what happened this past weekend. And people are either naïve to the influence of their actions, or they're simply resigned to ignore it."

Walensky pointed out how contagious the coronavirus has proven to be and, in one single day over the weekend, 50,000 new cases were reported. She added, even if an individual does not become ill, he or she can go on to infect others who might be harmed and even die from the virus.

"Let's remember there are 300 million people in this country who remain susceptible and have been uninfected so far, and this virus is far from running out people to infect," Walensky said, according to CNN.

According to Johns Hopkins University data, 32 states are reporting higher rates of new cases this week compared to last week. Some experts blame the alarming trend on states opening up too early, while others pointed to lack of contact tracing, especially in Florida.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN, "I don't think we are doing very well," when asked about our nation's report card on contact tracing efforts.

There is no vaccine for the virus and the only drug that has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat the disease is in short supply. The antiviral drug, remdesivir, might shorten recovery times for infected people.

According to CNN, the country has sufficient supplies of the drug if the pandemic does not get worse and should be reserved only for the very sick, said experts. But, according to the latest figures, the pandemic is getting worse, and unless we stem the tide, we will not have the resource to help those who are critically ill.

According to an editorial published in Vox, America could have prevented this new surge. Experts said states relaxed their restrictions too soon and reopened their economies, allowing people to return to work and patrons to go back into the world and interact, fueling new cases.

"It's a situation that didn't have to be," Jaime Slaughter-Acey, an epidemiologist at the University of Minnesota told Vox. "For almost three months, you have opportunities to be proactive with respect to mitigating the COVID-19 pandemic and to help normalize culture and adopt practices that would stem the tide of transmission as well as the development of COVID-19 complications. It was not prioritized over the economy."