Housing & Urban Development Secretary Dr. Ben Carson told "The Story" Thursday about the progression of the coronavirus pandemic.
The former pediatric neurosurgeon and currently a member of Trump's COVID-19 task force said to the host Martha MacCallum that the United States' curve of cases appears to be leveling out.
The secretary said that not enough public attention is being paid to "the number of people who have recovered" from coronavirus". He also expressed his belief that approximately 98 percent of people who contract coronavirus will recover.
"You probably do know someone that has it, you may have it, who knows?" Carson continued. "But people have been terrified because we've talked about the bad."
At the same time, Carson acknowledged that if we "destroy the economic infrastructure of our country," there will be more difficulties than there has been from the virus itself, Fox News noted.
"We can't operate out of hysteria," Carson said. "When people are hysterical they don't do logical things."
Dr.Ben added that when it comes to reopening the U.S. economy, the government must watch two conditions: the infection curve is low enough and adequate antibody testing is available.
"When we see that bell-shaped curve -- and we've seen it come down rather steeply in some other countries -- when that happens [and] we haven't seen it go back up, that's what we are looking for here," he said. "That already seems to be starting."
"Obviously, we don't want to [resume economic activity] too early. We will wait for a couple of weeks and see if that continues down and then we also need to make sure that we have appropriate testing."
"We have to be able to test people to see if they have the antibodies which will make them much safer in terms of returning to the workforce. And then we have to return them in a logical way. That's the key," Carson emphasized.
He also mentioned that Americans should continue practicing social distancing and follow the other guidelines from the White House coronavirus task force.
