CDC projects nearly 189K COVID-19 deaths by Sept. 5

Dr. Garth Walker, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine, joins Yahoo Finance's Kristin Myers to discuss the latest U.S. COVID-19 mortality projections from the CDC.

Video Transcript

KRISTIN MYERS: And on the coronavirus front, case counts in California top 600,000, as the CDC has projected roughly 189,000 coronavirus deaths by next month. September 5 is the date on that. So for more on this, we're joined now by Dr. Garth Walker, emergency physician at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine and Buehler Center of Health Economics and Policy.

Doctor, we've been talking a lot about the case counts. They are on the decline. Wondering just off the top why you don't think that we can get a handle on this crisis right now?

GARTH WALKER: The reason why we can't get a handle on it, particularly right now, is we need complete buy-in from all stakeholders. And part of that is adhering to a universal mask mandate. If you look across states, states that do have high rates of using their masks, as well as adhering to public health measures, they've been able to keep the rates pretty low down.

And if we want to be able to be on the same page in terms of getting back to some form of normalcy, we have to be able to adhere to a lot of the measures that we have been advocating for recently to keep the transmission rates down. And in order for anybody to get back to their day-to-day business, they need some form of continuity. And part of that is people that may not be interested in putting on a mask or other facets of our economy, as well as the United States that are not able to do that or believe in it for whatever reason there is.

KRISTIN MYERS: Well, Doctor, you're not the only one that supports universal mask mandates. Dr. Fauci also said in a conversation-- I can't believe I'm going to say this, but with Matthew McConaughey, the actor. I never thought I would mention Dr. Fauci talking with him.

But he said that he also supports universal mask mandates. Dr. Fauci, not the actor. I'm not sure what he thinks about it. I know you're saying that should be the way to go. Why do you think we can't get some sort of universal mask mandate in the United States?

GARTH WALKER: I think one of the challenges is that we have been politicizing public health. Leaders in public health have been advocating for this, essentially from the start. We know that if we want to be able to achieve equity, if we want to be able to protect our most vulnerable, we need people that may be in privileged situations to be able to adhere to the mask mandate, or at least high proportion of our society putting on their masks and practicing distance from other people. And I think the politicizing of it, not necessarily adhering to science-based measures has been very challenging for us to get our message out.

KRISTIN MYERS: So that number that I had mentioned in my introduction to you, 189,000 deaths is what the CDC is projecting by September 5, so about three weeks from now. That means over 20,000 people would have to die, essentially, in-- in just under a month. How alarming is that? I heard that number, and I thought that that seemed like a very large surge, given where we are right now.

Actually, I'm just looking at the death count right now. It's 167,528 in the United States. So that seems like a very large leap. Is that just par for the course in what we're seeing? Or when you hear a number like that, are you also alarmed that we're going to be seeing some sort of very large spike coming in the next couple of weeks?

GARTH WALKER: Thanks, Kristin. I am alarmed, particularly because this is considered avoidable, right? We can put forth measures to help offset these projections. If we know that our current trend is 20,000 deaths from now, we need to get everyone on line in terms of putting on a mask, practicing six-feet distance, and making sure that we are doing our part to protect our family, our friends, our communities, people within our economy that are struggling to get their jobs going and want to get to some form of stability to some degree later. So it's more than just deaths. But at base line, we should have enough empathy to be able to ensure that we are adhering to these measures and thinking about how we can help save each other's lives.

KRISTIN MYERS: So the CDC also said that this fall could be the worst fall for public health. Schools are going to be reopening soon. Do you agree with that estimation that this could be the worst fall for public health? And how much do you think these school reopenings are going to play in that?

GARTH WALKER: I am concerned. I'm concerned with flu season, which we have a ton of data when it starts, what happens when people take vaccines, but also the collision course of COVID. At minimum, hospital systems need to be well-equipped and well-aware of potential surges. So ensuring that our hospital systems are able to bear that surge with competing viruses that could be putting multiple vulnerable populations at work-- at risk, it becomes very scary.

With the schools, it can be a double-edged sword. It's one of those situations where there's pros and cons, particularly if we're talking about schools that have very high dense areas, such as public schools, schools in underserved populations that may not be able to have the appropriate ratios or the space to safely protect against transmission.

But at the same time, a lot of those communities are residing-- people of color and vulnerable communities are residing in regions where they rely on school for lunch, or they rely on school for childcare. So it can be very challenging. But at minimum, we need to be very intentional about how we are thinking about both communities, our most vulnerable communities, as well as our most privileged communities, in the event that they go to school as well as stay home.

KRISTIN MYERS: All right, we'll have to leave that there. Dr. Garth Walker, emergency physician at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine. Thanks so much for joining us today.

GARTH WALKER: Thank you.