Dec 19, 2021 - Health

U.S. could see 1 million COVID cases a day, warns retiring NIH director

Ivana Saric

Francis Collins. Photo: Sarah Silbiger-Pool/Getty Images

The Omicron variant could drive the U.S. toward U.S. hitting a million COVID-19 cases per day if Americans are not vigilant about mitigation strategies, outgoing National Institutes of Health director Francis Collins warned on NPR's "Weekend Edition" Sunday.

Driving the news: The variant has been detected in 89 countries and is driving COVID-19 cases to double every 1.5 to 3 days in areas where there is community spread, according to the World Health Organization.

What they're saying: "I know people are tired of this. I'm tired of it too, believe me. But the virus is not tired of us," Collins said.

"We do not know what this virus is capable of doing," he added. "And even if it has a somewhat lower risk of severity, we could be having a million cases a day if we're not really attentive to all of those mitigation strategies."
"Nobody expected Omicron — this one was really a curveball, a variant that has 57 different mutations in it that makes it almost like we're starting over with a different virus than where we began."

Go deeper: WHO says Omicron cases doubling in 1.5 to 3 days in places with local spread

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U.S. could see 1 million COVID cases a day, warns retiring NIH director

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