[dirk digler]

.

Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Monday that earlier projections of the disease's death toll in the United States assumed roughly half of Americans "would pay attention to the recommendations" first issued in March.

But now, "what we're seeing is a large majority of the American public are taking the social-distancing recommendations to heart," Redfield told AM 1030 KVOI Radio in Tucson, Ariz. "And I think that's the direct consequence of why you're seeing the numbers are going to be much, much, much, much lower than would have been predicted by the models."