Biden adviser says healthcare system is close to ‘literally breaking’

Osterholm, who serves as director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, warned people to take precautions such as refraining from “swapping air” with others, asserting that if they aren’t taken “our friends, our colleagues, we’re going to see these number grow substantially.”

“I think it is the healthcare systems breaking, literally breaking, that will, unfortunately, bring us to a sense of reality of what we must do in the short term,” he added.

When asked about the timeline where saw this collapse taking place, Osterholm said, “There are many healthcare systems that, a few more weeks of this level of activity, and that will happen.”

In an early August op-ed for the New York Times, Osterholm suggested the country lock down for four to six weeks and that people be compensated with a wage package of some sort from the government.

“We could pay for a package right now to cover all of the lost wages for individual workers, for losses to small companies, to medium-sized companies or city, state, county governments. We could do all of that,” he told Yahoo Finance Live. “If we did that, then we could lock down for four to six weeks, and if we did that, we could drive the numbers down.”

Osterholm later said he had never discussed his suggestion with Biden’s team.

“Nobody’s going to support it,” he said. “It’s not going to be supported out of the administration. It’s not going to be supported in Congress.”

To date, the United States has confirmed more than 10.9 million cases and over 245,000 deaths due to COVID-19. Several states have begun imposing coronavirus restrictions and mask mandates as cases continue to surge.