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2020 -- The Year of the Coronavirus

One "disturbing" characteristic of COVID-19 made it clear the battle against coronavirus would be unlike any other disease-prevention effort, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's leading infectious disease expert: The fact that so many cases were passed along by people who had no symptoms. "We're seeing that even people without symptoms transmitting it, and that to me is something that was the game-changer," said Fauci in an interview this week. "It was the game-changer in everything we did." It changed testing, because only testing symptomatic people would miss those who were asymptomatic, he explained.

Additionally, "Mask wearing became much more important, because if you're only worried about somebody who's symptomatic, then you'll know who you're dealing with," said Fauci. "But if you don't know who's infected, then everybody should be wearing a mask, which is the real fundamental rationale for saying we need universal and uniform wearing of masks."

The stealthy nature of the disease took even Fauci—who has served six presidential administrations over four decades—aback. "I guess you could use the word surprising. It was a combination of surprising and disturbing," he said. 

"The other thing that has really been an issue is that I've never seen a virus like this—and I've been dealing with viral outbreaks for the last, you know, 40 years—where you have such a range of involvement of seriousness, from 40% of the people who get infected and have absolutely no symptoms at all, to those who have symptoms," added Fauci. "About 80% have mild to moderate symptoms that generally require staying at home for a few days, maybe sometimes a couple of weeks."

And then about 20% to 25% of COVID patients get severe enough symptoms that they require hospitalization and intensive care, "and then they die," said Fauci.

That's what Fauci considers "the mystery" of COVID-19—how differently it can behave in different people.

According to the CDC, more than 19.4 million cases of coronavirus have been reported in the U.S., and more than 337,000 people have died.