NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a foremost figure in the fight against coronavirus, said Thursday that he's "cautiously optimistic" New York is hitting the peak in its number of cases.
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The rate of hospitalizations and ICU admissions in New York state has been declining this week even as the number of deaths continues to rise.
Officials said the spike in daily deaths is likely patients who were admitted to hospitals a week or two ago and did not recover, while the drop in hospitalizations could reflect social-distancing measures and stay-at-home orders put in place last month.
On ABC's "Good Morning America" Thursday, Fauci said that decline in overall hospitalizations could mean New York is flattening the curve.
"It's tough to tell. We very well may be there," he said. "It's looking like it's going to make a turn, but you know, I am cautiously optimistic. I think that is what's going on."
Fauci echoed those sentiments on NBC's "Today" show Thursday, saying the decrease in hospitalizations in New York offers "some glimmers of hope."
"I'm always very cautious about jumping the gun and saying, 'Well, we have turned the corner' but I think we are really looking at the beginning of that, which would really be very encouraging. We need that right now," he said.
"So we are hoping, with cautious optimism, that at the same time we're in for a bad week, we're going to start to see a turnaround. And I think it will."
Fauci also said Thursday that people shouldn't assume the coronavirus will fade with the warmer weather.
Fauci told "Good Morning America" there's precedent with other infections like influenza that "when the virus gets warmer that the virus goes down in its ability to replicate, to spread."
But Fauci added "having said that, one should not assume that we are going to be rescued by a change in the weather. You must assume that the virus will continue to do its thing. If we get some help from the weather, so be it, fine. But I don't think we need to assume that."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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