What they’re saying: The falling number of new deaths are “among other things a reflection of improvements in medical care, and more diagnosed cases occurring in milder disease and younger patients as older individuals protect themselves better,” former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb recently tweeted.
Yes, but: Young people don’t exist in social silos; they visit older family members and interact with older or sicker coworkers. That means that as these more vulnerable groups get the virus, the death rate may shoot back up.
“The death rate always lags several weeks behind the infection rate,” top infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci told me.
