The head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned on Wednesday the COVID-19 pandemic, still raging with unprecedented fury nationwide, will pose the country’s grimmest health crisis yet over the next few months, before vaccines become widely available. CDC Director Dr Robert Redfield urged stricter adherence to safety precautions such as wearing face coverings, social distancing and good hand hygiene to slow the spread of a highly contagious respiratory virus now claiming well over 2,000 U.S. lives a day. The sober message from one of the nation’s top health officers followed Thanksgiving holiday observances in which millions of Americans disregarded warnings to avoid travel and large gatherings even as COVID infections and hospitalizations surged largely unchecked. Besides the monumental loss of life, Redfield said, the country faces the prospect of a healthcare system strained to the point of collapse. The contagion has now reached […]