Dr. Fauci 'totally in favor' of reopening America — because remaining closed could cause 'irreparable damage'

Dr. Anthony Fauci says if America doesn't reopen soon, it will suffer "irreparable damage."

What are the details?

On Friday, White House health adviser Fauci said that he supports reopening the country, and insisted that the country "can't stay locked down."

Fauci has been working with the Trump administration since the early days of the pandemic in order to gauge a proper and effective response to the deadly virus.

In a statement, Fauci told CNBC, "I don't want people to think that any of us feel that staying locked down for a prolonged period of time is the way to go."

He said that the government had no other choice during the initial days of the COVID-19 outbreak to shut down.

"[It] had to do that," he said.

Fauci added that proper precautions needs to be put in place — and soon — because the time has come to "seriously look at reopening the economy."

"[N]ow is the time, depending upon where you are and what your situation is, to begin to seriously look at reopening the economy, reopening the country to try to get back to some degree or normal," he said.

"I'm totally in favor of that if done in the proper way and appropriate setting," he added.

What else?

Fauci did issue a warning, however, and advised against relaxing social distancing measures too soon, and pointed out his concerns that some areas across the United States may be skipping steps or rushing through them in order to reopen.

"In general, I think most of the country is [using social distancing measures] in a prudent way," he said. "There are obviously some situations where people might be jumping over that. I just say please proceed with caution if you're going to do that."

At the time of this writing, researchers at Johns Hopkins University estimate that at least 5,169,907 coronavirus cases have been confirmed around the world, with at least 335,995 deaths resulting from the deadly respiratory disease.