Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Prepare Yourself For Another Year Of Masking, Fauci Predicts
Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, President Biden鈥檚 chief medical adviser for Covid-19, said on Sunday that Americans may still be wearing masks outside their homes a year from now, even as he predicted the country would return to 鈥渁 significant degree of normality鈥 by fall. 鈥淚 want it to keep going down to a baseline that鈥檚 so low there is virtually no threat,鈥 Dr. Fauci said on the CNN program 鈥淪tate of the Union,鈥 referring to the number of cases nationally that would make him comfortable enough to stop recommending universal masking. 鈥淚f you combine getting most of the people in the country vaccinated with getting the level of virus in the community very, very low, then I believe you鈥檙e going to be able to say, for the most part, we don鈥檛 necessarily have to wear masks.鈥 (Goodnough, 2/22)
Pandemic-weary Americans have employed a particular dependent clause so often that it has become a cliche: 鈥淲hen things are back to normal ...鈥 Kids back to school. Parents back at work. Bars. Gyms. Concerts. Travel. Dinner parties. It is a phrase as optimistic as it is anticipatory. But it hides a burning question: When will things be normal again? (Thebault, 2/21)
And Dr. Fauci says he lacked direction from the Trump administration 鈥
Anthony Fauci, the nation鈥檚 top infectious diseases expert, said scientists lacked 鈥渁ny direction鈥 during the last days of former President Trump鈥檚 time in office. In an interview with The Telegraph published on Friday, Fauci said that scientists were 鈥渁cting alone鈥 trying to protect the nation from the pandemic during the last two months of Trump鈥檚 presidency. (Williams, 2/19)
Dr. Anthony Fauci continues to open up about his experiences working under the Trump administration, revealing the moment he began to lose influence with former President Donald Trump.聽In a wide-ranging interview with The Telegraph,聽the infectious disease specialist recalled a marked shift in his professional relationship with Trump in April or May of last year, once the president began to publicly side with anti-lockdown protesters and back states鈥 efforts to lift stay-at-home orders.聽 (Wong, 2/19)
