The former director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says New York could have reduced the number of deaths from coronavirus by up to 80% if it acted sooner.

Tom Frieden, who also previously served as commissioner of the New York City Health Department, tells The New York Times that the Empire State should have closed schools and non-essential businesses two weeks earlier than it did and begun social distancing at the beginning of March.

“Flu was coming down, and then you saw this new ominous spike. And it was COVID. And it was spreading widely in New York City before anyone knew it,” Dr. Frieden told the newspaper. “You have to move really fast. Hours and days. Not weeks. Once it gets a head of steam, there is no way to stop it.”

California has had much fewer cases — 19,063 infected with COVID-19 and 507 deaths — than New York, which has confirmed over 150,000 cases and more than 6,200 deaths. California was the first to issue a statewide stay-at-home order on March 19, three days before New York did the same.

Frieden told the Times that New York could have similarly kept its numbers down, by 50 to 80%, if it acted sooner. He did not elaborate on the basis for those figures.

2 days later & NYC deaths would have doubled. Days earlier & so many deaths could have been prevented. A warning to all: #COVID19 moves fast, we must move faster to increase physical distancing. https://t.co/GxsLrzPMXr pic.twitter.com/Pojy9V0a2J — Dr. Tom Frieden (@DrTomFrieden) April 6, 2020

California had its first confirmed case of COVID-19 on Jan. 25, five days before the World Health Organization declared a global health emergency; the state began restricting large gatherings in early March and closed all schools by March 16; a statewide stay-at-home order took effect March 19.

New York, on the other hand, didn’t have its first confirmed case of coronavirus until March 1. Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency on March 7 and began issuing social distancing guidelines and closing non-essential businesses gradually; a statewide stay-at-home order took effect March 22.

“Every action I took was criticized at the time as premature,” Cuomo told the Times. “The facts have proven my decisions correct.”

“We’re dealing with a virus that’s only months old and science that changes by the day ... hindsight is a luxury none of us have in the heat of battle,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio told the newspaper.

The New York Times, meanwhile, reports two new studies have found that the novel coronavirus in New York originated in Europe, not China. President Donald Trump barred foreign nationals from entering the U.S. if they had been in China on Jan. 31, but allowed for exceptions. Trump has declined to issue a nationwide stay-at-home order, but shared social distancing guidelines in mid-March.

Research shows the virus’ spread may have been detected sooner if more testing was available in the U.S. earlier. Government labs only processed 352 COVID-19 tests in the month of February, CDC data shows.

“You cannot fight a fire blindfolded,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, head of the World Health Organization, said last month. “We cannot stop this pandemic if we don’t know who is infected.”

New York has become the epicenter for coronavirus in America, with more than 150,000 cases and 6,268 deaths as of Wednesday morning. New Jersey has the second-most cases with 47,437, followed by Michigan with just over 20,000.

Frieden served as director of the CDC from 2009 to 2017, leading the U.S. response to Ebola and H1N1 swine flu.

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