In a Friday New York Times op-ed he authored with Michael T. Osterholm, a professor and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, Kashkari argues that the government should issue a shelter-in-place order “for everyone but the truly essential workers” for up to six weeks.

March’s lockdown, issued as the coronavirus became a pandemic, was not sufficiently stringent and has led to the U.S. lagging other stricter nations when it has come to containing Covid-19, they said. The result “could make what we have experienced so far seem like just a warm-up to a greater catastrophe.”

“To be effective, the lockdown has to be as comprehensive and strict as possible,” Kashkari and Osterholm wrote. “If we aren’t willing to take this action, millions more cases with many more deaths are likely before a vaccine might be available. In addition, the economic recovery will be much slower, with far more business failures and high unemployment for the next year or two.”