Dr. Anthony Fauci, White House Chief Medical Advisor and Director of the NIAID, responds to questions from Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) at a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on January 11, 2022 in Washington, D.C.
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White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci on Thursday said the U.S. is at a crossroads within the Covid-19 pandemic as latest omicron subvariants are gaining ground across the country.
Fauci, in a radio interview Thursday, said the pandemic has clearly eased since last winter, but deaths, which average greater than 2,600 per week, remain far too high. At the identical time, the brand new omicron variants are knocking out key tools used to guard essentially the most vulnerable.
“We’re really at a degree that could be a crossroads here. As we’re getting into the cooler months, we’re beginning to see the emergence of sublineage variants of omicron,” Fauci said on the “Conversations on Health Care” radio show.
Natural infection from the BA.5 subvariant or vaccination with the brand new boosters should provide protection against these subvariants for healthy people, Fauci said. But U.S. health officials are concerned the subvariants will mainly knock out antibody treatments similar to Evusheld that play a key role in protecting individuals with severely compromised immune systems, he said.
The omicron subvariants BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 are of best concern. They’re immune to Evusheld and are increasing within the U.S. every week. BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 represent 27% of infections combined while omicron BA.5 has declined to 50%, in response to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Fauci said the U.S. must dramatically reduce the variety of Covid deaths, which currently stand at about 400 per day, before the country can declare the pandemic over.
“We’re still in the course of this — it will not be over,” Fauci said. “4 hundred deaths per day will not be an appropriate level. We would like to get it much lower than that.”
Fauci said hospitals could face a “negative trifecta” this winter from emerging Covid variants in addition to resurgent flu and respiratory syncytial virus. The U.S. should expect a more severe flu season based on what scientists observed in Australia, he said. And there is already a major uptick in RSV cases within the U.S., he added.
“It is going to be very confounding and might even stress the hospital system, particularly for the pediatric population,” Fauci said.
Though RSV resembles a gentle cold for most individuals, the virus will be dangerous for infants and newborns. Between 58,000 and 80,000 kids younger than 5 are hospitalized with it every yr, in response to CDC.
The severity of the flu varies season to season depending on the efficacy of the vaccine and the strain circulating. Essentially the most severe season of the past decade was in 2017 when the virus killed 52,000 people and hospitalized greater than 700,000, in response to CDC. Within the mildest season pre-pandemic, the flu killed 23,000 people and hospitalized 280,000.
There isn’t a vaccine for RSV yet, though Pfizer has a candidate that was 81% effective at stopping severe disease in newborn infants. Latest boosters for omicron as well flu shots are widely available.
Fauci said everyone who’s eligible should get their Covid boosters and flu shot. Individuals who face a high risk from respiratory viruses should consider wearing a mask indoors in public, Fauci said. Those that have people of their homes who’re vulnerable should do the identical, he said.
People must also consider taking rapid Covid tests before going to social gatherings indoors where vulnerable individuals will likely be present, Fauci said.
“That may be a excellent way of creating sure you do not spread infections, so utilization of tests, wearing masks where appropriate and getting vaccinated,” he said.
