Fox News host: Sharp rise in coronavirus cases is “actually good news”

Steve Hilton: “It's completely ridiculous, to look at these numbers and think it's an excuse to roll back the reopenings. We should be speeding them up.”

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Citation From the July 10, 2020, edition of Fox Business’ Varney & Co.

ASHLEY WEBSTER (GUEST HOST): All right, we're going to switch from New York to the other coast now — California, your home state, Steve. California recorded more than 7,000 new virus cases on Thursday, 7,031 to be exact. Now, Los Angeles, to your south, is considering another stay-at-home order. I mean, is that necessary, really, to stop the spread?

STEVE HILTON (HOST, THE NEXT REVOLUTION W/ STEVE HILTON): I think they literally don't understand what this virus is, or how it works. The whole point of everything we were doing was to flatten the curve, so that you'd avoid a crash on the hospitals. We're nowhere near that in California. The governor keeps updating us, he's in the low percentage figures, the proportion of the hospital beds. The idea that you just keep everything shut down so you don't get any cases is ridiculous — when most cases, the vast majority of cases, are completely harmless for most people.

Of course, you're going to get more cases when you do two things — open up the economy, which been happening steadily, so that people mix with each other, and test more people. This is totally predictable. It's actually good news, as Dr. Scott Atlas from Hoover said, because it moves us further forward to the point where the virus can't spread anymore.

So it's completely ridiculous, to look at these numbers and think it's an excuse to roll back the reopenings. We should be speeding them up.

WEBSTER: And do they not understand the damage that's done to the economy, once these orders go in place? I mean, it's very hard to recover from.

HILTON: Well, this actually goes to their philosophy, and actually connects to the earlier conversation about Biden and the loony left. They genuinely believe that government can be a good substitute for the free-market economy. That's what they think. So they have no problem shutting everything down. They say, “Oh, it's fine, governor, we'll take care of it all.” It's so destructive.

WEBSTER: All right, well, we'll have to leave it there. But Steve Hilton, as always, fired up. So much to go at, too, these days Steve. It's great to be in the TV business. Thanks so much.

Contrary to Hilton's assertion about hospital capacity, there are already reports about possible shortages of ICU beds Ventura County, Yolo CountySan Bernadino County, Imperial County, and Riverside County in California, and additional concern about Los Angeles County and Placer County in the weeks ahead.