Fauci says the US's record-high COVID-19 cases put it in a precarious position: 'No matter how you look at it, it's not good news'

• The US hit new daily peaks for COVID-19 cases on Friday and Saturday, with reports of more than 80,000 new cases per day.
• "Now we're at the highest baseline we've ever been, which is really precarious," Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's leading expert on COVID-19, said in an interview Monday.
• Fauci said in September that Americans needed to "hunker down" as the weather turned cold or face increased outbreaks.

When it comes to daily COVID-19 cases, the US is experiencing "the worst that we've ever had," Dr. Anthony Fauci said Monday during an interview with Yahoo Finance. The country hit new daily peaks on Friday and Saturday, with reports of more than 80,000 new cases per day.

"Now we're at the highest baseline we've ever been, which is really precarious," the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the nation's top expert on the COVID-19 pandemic said. "No matter how you look at it, it's not good news."

In September, Fauci said Americans would need to "hunker down and get through this fall and winter" or else play a game of whack-a-mole with the virus as blips and outbreaks pop up. Since the weather has turned colder, new COVID-19 cases have sharply risen. New COVID-19 cases clocked in at 82,929 on Friday and 83,851 on Saturday, breaking the previous record of 74,818 set in July, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Luckily, despite the fact that we are dealing with a very, very challenging period right now, even more so as we enter the cooler months of the fall and the colder months of the winter, that vaccines are proceeding at a very good pace," Fauci said on Monday.

Results from vaccine trials will be available at the end of November or beginning of December, Fauci said. And last week, Gilead's remdesivir was approved for use on COVID-19 patients.

In the face of surging infections, Fauci reminded Americans that measures like universal mask-wearing, avoiding crowds and indoor public settings, and handwashing could go a long way in stemming outbreaks.

"We can do this. I'm absolutely convinced that as a nation, if we pull together and do some fundamental common-denominator public-health measures, that we can get through this with a lot of help in the future from vaccines and adequate therapies," Fauci said.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has surpassed 43 million cases worldwide, the US has experienced the worst toll of any country. There have been nearly 8.7 million reported cases in the US and about 225,000 reported deaths, according to Johns Hopkins data.

Watch the full interview with Fauci over at Yahoo Finance.