Trump warns that there will be ‘a lot of death’ in coming weeks amid COVID-19 outbreak

President Trump on Saturday warned that the United States is approaching what could be the country’s roughest stretch yet amid the escalating coronavirus outbreak while saying that the country can’t stay closed forever.

“This will be probably the toughest week, between this week and next week,” Mr. Trump said at the White House daily briefing on the COVID-19 outbreak. “There [will] be a lot of death, unfortunately.”

Mr. Trump spoke as the number of coronavirus cases in the U.S. jumped above 300,000. There have been more than 8,200 coronavirus-related deaths in the U.S. and more than 14,500 people have recovered, according to the Johns Hopkins University tracker.

Worldwide, the number of cases is now above 1.1 million. There have been more than 64,000 deaths around the globe and more than 245,900 people have recovered, according to the JHU tracker.

Despite his dark warning, Mr. Trump also said repeatedly that the U.S. can’t stay closed forever.

“We’re going to make sure that it’s over soon, and just keep going - it’s not going to be long,” the president said.

“At a certain point, some hard decisions are going to have to be made,” Mr. Trump said. “I’ve said it from the beginning — the cure cannot be worse than the problem itself.”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, a member of the White House coronavirus task force, said they will be keeping a close eye on the number of new cases and urged the public to continue to adhere to “social distancing” practices the government is recommending.

“As sobering and as difficult as this is, what we are doing is making a difference,” said Dr. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

On March 16, Mr. Trump had announced a 15-day period during which people were advised to stay home and avoid crowds if possible. He recently extended that guidance until April 30.

In a break from past guidance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is also now recommending that the general public wear cloth coverings over their faces when people venture out in public.

Mr. Trump said Friday that the new guidance on masks is voluntary and that he doesn’t plan to wear one.

“The one thing I am confident in, so let’s take this to the bank: mitigation works - it does,” Dr. Fauci said. “We’ve seen it in other countries; we’ve seen it in our own country.”

“Mitigation does work, but again — we’re not going to destroy our country,” Mr. Trump followed up to say.

Mr. Trump spoke earlier in the day to about a dozen commissioners of major sports leagues in the country and said he wanted to see crowds back in stadiums and arenas in the relatively near future.

“Whenever we’re ready — I mean, as soon as we can obviously,” he said. “And the fans want to be back, too. They want to see basketball and football and hockey — they want to see their sports. They want to go out onto the golf courses and breathe nice, clean, beautiful fresh air.”

He said people aren’t going to have to practice physical separation guidelines for “the rest of our times on the planet.”

“Eventually, people are going to be able to occupy those seats in arenas next to each other,” he said. “They want to sit next to each other at restaurants. They don’t want to be six feet away.”

The coronavirus has wreaked havoc on the U.S. economy, with employers shedding at least 701,000 jobs in March and a record-breaking number of people filing for new unemployment claims in recent weeks.

But Mr. Trump said their sole consideration is trying to save lives, and chided “certain media outlets” for spreading unspecified false rumors.

“I guess they’re looking for ratings — I don’t know what they’re looking for,” he said. “It’s so bad for our country.”

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo had estimated earlier in the day that the “apex” in New York, the hardest-hit state, was likely about a week away.

“This is a painful, disorienting situation,” Mr. Cuomo said. “This day will end and we will get through it and we will get to the other side of the mountain. And we will be better for it. But we have to do what we have to do between now and then.”