Fauci: Americans should be prepared to 'hunker down' even more

The nation's top infectious disease expert warned Sunday that Americans should prepare to take far more drastic steps to blunt the rapid spread of the novel coronavirus, which has sickened thousands of Americans across the country and prompted calls for a wide-scale withdrawal from public life.

"I think Americans should be prepared that they are going to have to hunker down significantly more than we as a country are doing," Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

His warning comes as the virus, which causes a disease called COVID-19, has caused the cancellation of events across the globe, as well as travel bans - and in some countries, domestic travel restrictions. Health officials have warned Americans to practice social distancing to limit the amount of community transmission and avoid overwhelming an already-strained health care system.