Covid 19 live updates: Health experts worry about variant-driven surge as states lift restrictions
The Biden administration on Monday touted the increased pace of vaccinations and Senate’s passage of the American Rescue Plan as promising signs in the “war” on the coronavirus.
“President Biden came into office with two clear immediate goals — mount a vaccination program to turn the tide on the pandemic and pass a rescue plan to bring the nation through these tough times successfully,” Andy Slavitt, senior White House adviser for the coronavirus response, told reporters at a press briefing. “This weekend, we took critical steps on both fronts.”
Slavitt noted that the nation’s vaccination pace has sped up, with nearly 2.2 million shots a day administered in the past week, up from about 900,000 when Biden took office. Slavitt also said that Congress’s $1.9 trillion legislative package, directed by Biden, would address poverty while ramping up other resources to fight the pandemic.
Marcella Nunez-Smith, who’s leading the Biden administration’s work on health equity and the coronavirus, pointed to progress rolling out community vaccination centers that are focused on hard-hit, high-risk communities. “By the end of this week, we’ll have 18 of those sites running across seven states, with the ability to administer 61,000 total shots per week,” Nunez-Smith said.
Nunez-Smith also said that the administration is still working on its planned messaging campaign to address vaccine hesitancy. Nearly one-third of GOP voters say they “definitely won’t” get the vaccine, and polls have found widespread skepticism in communities of color, as well.
Meanwhile, Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious-disease expert, offered a brief update on researchers’ efforts to develop antivirals that hinder the progression of covid-19 symptoms and help infected people avoid needing to be hospitalized. “That is the direction that we will be going over the next weeks to months to years,” Fauci said, comparing the fight to the effort to combat HIV.
At the briefing, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky also unveiled long-awaited guidance on how vaccinated Americans can socialize and pursue daily activities.
“I hope people view this as a hopeful day in the next steps of the pandemic,” Slavitt said.
