Top US infectious disease expert Dr Anthony Fauci corrected his earlier prediction where he had “misspoke” about the United States getting good control over the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) by the fall of 2022. During an interview with NPR, the chief medical advisor to the White House had said if the overwhelming majority of the unvaccinated population get jabbed, the United States could “start to really get some good control over” the pandemic as they get into the fall of 2022.
“I have to apologise,” Fauci told CNN’s Anderson Cooper when asked about his prediction. “When I listened to the tape, I meant to say the Spring of 2022, so I did misspeak.”
Fauci clarified he wanted to say if the country gets through “this winter” and the overwhelming majority of the 90 million unvaccinated people get vaccinated, the US could start to get some good control in the “Spring of 2022”. The United States is witnessing another Covid-19 wave largely driven by the highly contagious Delta variant as about 90 million eligible people remain unvaccinated.
On Monday, Fauci told NPR that it is difficult to correctly predict the curve of the pandemic when 90 million people are unvaccinated. He said there is the possibility of the coronavirus continuing to circulate, mutate, form more variants and take the country back to a similar or worse situation caused by the Delta variant.
The United States continues to report one of the highest daily new Covid-19 cases, overall as well as per capita. According to the latest epidemiological update by the World Health Organization (WHO), the highest numbers of new cases from August 9 – August 15 were reported by the US, Iran and India. However, the highest numbers of new deaths in the same week were reported by Indonesia, Brazil and Russia.
