A New York City doctor said President Trump was practicing “magical thinking” when he suggested that Easter may be the end of the coronavirus outbreak.
Trump said on Tuesday that he hoped the outbreak would be over by Easter, which lands on April 12 this year. Dr. Craig Spencer, the director of global medicine at the Columbia University Medical Center, told CNN hours later that the president’s timeline is not realistic.
“Last week when I went to work, we talked about the one or two patients amongst the dozens of others that might have been a COVID, a coronavirus patient. This week in my shift yesterday, nearly every single patient that I took care of was coronavirus, and many of them extremely severe. Many were put on breathing tubes. Many decompensated quite quickly,” Spencer explained.
He continued, “There is a very different air this week than there was last week. And, quite honestly, think about the fact that our first New York City case was on March 1. That’s just over three weeks ago. To think that we’ll be in any place to lift these restrictionary measures by Easter in two or three weeks, for me, seems completely magical thinking.”
Spencer said that he thinks the outbreak is just starting, adding, “We’re really at the beginning of this outbreak. You can feel that. You can sense it. It’s palpable on the front lines in the emergency department.”
New York has become the U.S. epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic. As of Wednesday morning, more than 25,000 cases had been confirmed in the state along with 210 related deaths. Spencer said the outbreak stretched the supply of personal protective gear thin, leaving doctors with one mask per shift.
“Everyone is doing everything they can to conserve supplies because we know we’re just at the beginning of this. And after New York will be New Jersey, will be New Mexico. This is going to be a marathon,” he explained. “We are not even at the beginning of this.”
