Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), attends a coronavirus task force briefing at the White House on April 8. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Monday "it's important to look at the country as many different separate situations" when asked on the "Today" show if it was conceivable to relax social distancing guidelines by May.

"This pandemic has affected different parts of the country differently," Redfield said. "We're looking at the data very carefully, county by county by county, and we will be assessing that."

Redfield told NBC's Savannah Guthrie that in his view, a number of things need to happen before reopening the country, including increasing public health capacity to do early case identification, isolation and contract tracing.

He added officials also need to "start working to rebuild confidence in the community, so the community has confidence to reopen."