#Anthony Fauci tells House panel that COVID-19 pandemic isn’t going away soon

Dr. Anthony Fauci said Friday that health experts are “cautiously optimistic” about a coronavirus vaccine that just began the final stage of clinical testing — but warned the pandemic isn’t going away anytime soon.

Fauci was on Capitol Hill to testify before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis about the country’s plan to combat COVID-19.

“While it remains unclear how long the pandemic will last, COVID-19 activity will likely continue for some time,” Fauci, wearing a red, white and blue Washington Nationals 2019 World Series Champions mask, said in prepared remarks.

He added, “We hope that by the time we get into late fall, early winter we will have in fact a vaccine that we can say is safe and effective. We are cautiously optimistic that this will be successful.”

Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director and Adm. Brett Giroir, assistant secretary of Health and Human Services, will also testify.

“It is clear that the administration’s approach of deferring to states, sidling the experts and rushing to reopen has prolonged this virus and led to thousands of preventable deaths,” said Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), the chair of the subcommittee, in his opening remarks. “In fact, the US response stands out as among the worst of any country in the world.

“My question is, where should we go from here?”

Ranking member Rep. Steve Scalise (R-Louisiana) repeatedly held up a massive stack of documents he said was the Trump administration’s plan on how to safely reopen the country and schools.

He also slammed China for “lying” about the pandemic.

“We all know not only did China lie, they corrupted the World Health Organization,” Scalise said. “The Chinese community party wouldn’t let you [Fauci] in when President Trump wanted to send medical experts into China before it spread into the United States. “Why aren’t we having a hearing on that?”

The US leads the world with COVID-19 cases, with more than 4.4 million confirmed cases and 152,075 deaths as of Friday morning, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

More than 67,600 new cases were reported on Thursday alone.