‘This is the worst event that this country will face’: Stark warning from White House Covid adviser as winter surge worsens

Deborah Birx says she is concerned to hear members of local communities ‘parroting back’ misinformation about the effectiveness of masks

White House coronavirus response coordinator Deborah Birx on Sunday warned that an expected winter surge in Covid-19 cases was likely to be the most trying event in the history of the country.

“This is not just the worst public health event. This is the worst event that this country will face, not just from a public health side,” Dr Birx, said during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Her message offers a stark contrast to that of President Trump, who is hosting crowds of people inside the White House for Christmas parties with invitations to at least 20 separate events being sent out.  

"I think it's really important that every single person understands that the way this virus is spread is if you're with anyone indoors without a mask, that's a viral spreading opportunity," Dr Birx said. "If you're outdoors and hugging and kissing individuals, that is a viral spreading opportunity. We have to really understand how contagious, how infectious, this virus is."

She said that there isn’t a state where the number of cases is not surging. The US currently has the highest number of Covid-19 cases of any country in the world, with more than 14 million confirmed infections and nearly 282,000 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

"So this is where we find ourselves," she said. "And we have to listen right now to what we know works, which is mask, physical distancing, washing your hands. But not gathering. You cannot gather without masks in any indoor or close outdoor situation."

While the show’s host Chuck Todd pressed Dr Birx on President Trump and his close associates contradicting the warnings by public health officials and violating the pandemic guidelines, Dr Birx, without mentioning the president, expressed her frustration at what she called the public “parroting back” misinformation.  

"When I go out, I don't just meet with health care providers and governors and mayors, but I also meet with the community," Dr Birx said. "And so I hear community members parroting back those situations, parroting back that masks don't work, parroting back that we should work toward herd immunity, parroting back that gatherings don't result in superspreading events. And I think our job is to constantly say those are myths, they are wrong and you can see the evidence base.

"Right now, across the Sun Belt, we have governors and mayors who have cases equivalent to what they had in the summertime, yet aren't putting in the same policies and mitigations that they put in the summer, that they know changed the course of this pandemic across the South," she added. "So it is frustrating, because not only do we know what works, governors and mayors used those tools to stem the tide in the spring and the summer.

“This fall/winter surge is combining everything that we saw in the spring with everything we saw in the summer — plus the fall surge going into a winter surge. I think that’s why Dr Redfield made this absolute appeal to the American people,” Dr Birx said.  

On Wednesday, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr Robert Redfield said that the coming months will be “the most difficult time in the public health history of this nation.  

Dr Birx said that every state across the country needs to increase mitigation efforts and inform residents that the holiday gatherings will lead to a surge, as she called on Americans to change their behaviour ahead of the winter holidays.