Coronavirus cases, hospitalizations, and deaths are increasing, and vaccinations aren’t growing fast enough. The result is needless “pain and suffering,” says Dr. Anthony Fauci, the chief medical advisor to the President and the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. He appeared on Meet the Press yesterday with host Chuck Todd to discuss the rise in cases and what you can do to stay safe—and to keep small children safe. Read on for five essential points—and to ensure your health and the health of others, don’t miss these Sure Signs You Have “Long” COVID and May Not Even Know It.
1 Dr. Fauci Was Asked If We Will Have to “Live With” COVID Forever Officer used an infrared forehead thermometer to check fever and body temperature for virus symptoms. “In some respects, yes, but mostly no,” said Fauci. “And let me tell you why I say no, Chuck, because we have within our power the money to suppress this outbreak, at least in the United States; we want to do it globally.
And we’re playing an essential role in that. But once you’ve gone to the United States, we still have about 80 million people eligible to be vaccinated who are not vaccinated….If we got the overwhelming majority of those 80 million people vaccinated, you would see a dramatic turnaround in the dynamics of the outbreak. So it is up to us. We have the power to do it. We need to do it.”
2. Dr. Fauci Believes We are Victims of Our Polarization. Woman in medical protective mask getting an injection in arm vaccination. “So what you’re saying is right now, we’re a victim of our polarization,” asked Todd. “I believe so,” said Dr. Fauci. “I’ve been saying that. I mean, to me, it is astounding to deal with a public health crisis and this still divisiveness about things like mandating and masks and things like that. Let’s crush this outbreak and put that divisiveness and those differences aside.” Get vaccinated, he pleaded.
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3 Dr. Fauci Said Here’s How to Keep Kids Safe. Teacher and children with face masks back at school after covid-19 quarantine and lockdown. “Where do you see this wave going? And are we headed for more increases in cases as school, as a school in this virus circulate?” asked Todd. “Well, that’s possible, Chuck,” said Dr. Fauci.
“But I believe we can avoid it. I mean, you can prevent it by protecting the children. We want to get them back in the classroom. And we’ve been through that for a while, the harmful effects of keeping kids physically out of the class regarding psychological, mental, and social development, but we want to do it safely.
And there is a safe way to do that—it surrounds the children with people who are eligible to be vaccinated and who get vaccinated, teachers, school personnel, the students from 12 and older who are eligible to be vaccinated right now, to get them vaccinated and then abide by the CDC recommendations of having masks in the school and do other things to mitigate. And that could be ventilation, that could be testing.
That could be some things. We understand the risks, but we want to get the children back in school safely, and I believe it can be done.” “But as you know,” he continued, “there’s a lot of issues there that when you try to get mandating of masks, there’s pushback from certain authorities, which I feel is unfortunate because it’s going to endanger the health of the children.”
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4 Dr. Fauci Said the Current Thinking is Still to Get a Booster After 8 Months Women with face masks getting vaccinated, coronavirus, covid-19, and vaccination concept. Fauci has said to get your booster shot eight months after your last dose. President Joe Biden said the other day that five months was being discussed. So which is it? “Well, we’re still planning on eight months,” said Dr. Fauci.
“That was the calculation we made for this rollout. We’ll start on the week of September 20th, but as we said all along, that’s our plan, but we are open to data as they come in. This will have to go through the FDA process and the advisory committee on immunization practices that advises the CDC. So right now, we’re sticking with eight, but we’re open to any variation in that, based on the data.”
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5 How to Stay Safe Out There. Follow Fauci’s fundamentals and help end this pandemic, no matter where you live—get vaccinated ASAP; if you live in an area with low vaccination rates, wear an N95 face mask, don’t travel, social distance, avoid large crowds, don’t go indoors with people you’re not sheltering with (especially in bars), practice good hand hygiene, and to protect your life and the lives of others, don’t visit any of these 35 Places You’re Most Likely to Catch COVID.
