Why reopening economies will be a 'massive experiment'

As the United States begins to reopen its economy, debates rage world-wide about how to balance economic hardship with a public health hazard.

With no easy answers to the dilemma, Mohamed El-Erian, chief economic adviser for Allianz, says the focus needs to be on learning from the "massive experiment."

"The reality is that we are reopening," El-Erian said Tuesday in an interview on Quest Means Business."We need to judge not only the risk we took with respect to infection, but how people will behave, how businesses will behave."

"I don't know what the right answer is, but...we've got to learn and collect data and adapt quickly," he said.

Don't expect a smooth reopening, either, El-Erian warned.

"I think of this as, we used to live in this really sophisticated jigsaw puzzle that was put together... Now we're trying to put the puzzle back together and we don't have all the pieces," he said.