Coronavirus

Coronavirus Pandemic: Warriors' Stephen Curry hosts COVID-19 Q&A with Dr. Anthony Fauci on Instagram

Thursday, March 26, 2020

Coronavirus: Stephen Curry hosts COVID-19 Q&A with Dr. Fauci

Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry held a question and answer coronavirus panel with Dr. Anthony Fauci from the White House Coronavirus Task Force on Instagram Thursday.

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- It's been more than two weeks since the NBA canceled all games for the season. In the meantime, Warriors star Stephen Curry is doing what he can to raise awareness about coronavirus.

On Thursday, he held an Instagram live chat with National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci.

Fauci is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. He has advised six presidents on the AIDS epidemic and other emerging diseases such as ebola and zika.

Curry asked Dr. Fauci when he believes life might start getting back to normal, including large sporting events. Dr. Fauci didn't give an exact timeline.

"What you need, is you need to see the trajectory of the curve to start to go down," Dr. Fauci said, referring to flattening the curve and number of coronavirus cases.

CORONAVIRUS MAP: Updated number of COVID-19 cases, deaths in San Francisco Bay Area

"We've seen that in China, they went up and down, they're starting to get back to some normal life," he continued. "Korea is doing that. They're starting to come back down."

Dr. Fauci said places like Europe, particularly in Italy, are still going way up. He said in the United States it depends on the region, and that "you treat New York City a little different than you treat Nebraska."

"Like, New York City right now is having a terrible time and yet there are places in the country that are doing quite well," Dr. Fauci explained. "You could probably identify people, contact trace, and get them out of circulation."

"So a direct answer to your question," he continued. "We can start thinking about getting back to some degree of normality when the country as a whole has turned that corner and starts coming down."

Curry said he was inspired to host the Instagram Live with Dr. Fauci after seeing images of young people partying on beaches and hanging out in parks.

"That's one of the reasons I wanted to have this Q&A is to hopefully reach a different demographic or the people that are interested in the facts of what's going on," Curry said.

Dr. Fauci explained that while elderly people and people with underlying conditions are the most vulnerable, young people have risks, too.

"What we're starting to see is there are some people who are young, people your age,' Dr. Fauci told Curry, who is 32, "Young healthy, vigorous, who don't have underlying conditions, who are getting seriously ill."

"It's still a very, very small minority, but it doesn't mean young people like yourself should think they don't have any risk of getting ill," he added.

RELATED STORIES & VIDEOS: