Dr. Anthony Fauci, in a televised interview, warned that the U.S. will see additional COVID-19 variants capable of evading protection from the vaccines if the nation does not gain control over community spread of the delta variant.
Fauci, the chief medical adviser to the White House, made his remarks to "Good Morning America" host George Stephanopoulos on Thursday.
"That will happen, George, if we don't get good control over the community spread which is the reason why I and my colleagues keep saying and over again, it is very important to get as many people vaccinated as we possibly can," Fauci said.
"People who say, 'I don't want to get vaccinated because it's me and I'll worry about me, I'm not having any impact on anybody else,' that's just not the case.
"And when you give it ample opportunity to mutate, you may sooner or later get another variant, and it is possible that that variant might be in some respects worse than the already very difficult variant we're dealing with now, which is a major reason why you want to completely suppress the circulation of the virus in the community."
On Wednesday, Fauci told McClatchy that the delta variant may double to 200,000 cases a day in the U.S. in the coming weeks.
"What we’re seeing, because of this increase in transmissibility, and because we have about 93 million people in this country who are eligible to get vaccinated who don’t get vaccinated that you have a significant pool of vulnerable people," Fauci said.
The chief White House medical adviser stressed that "just a couple of months ago, we were having about 10,000 cases a day [and now] I think you’re likely going to wind up somewhere between 100,000 and 200,000 cases."
Fauci said he is concerned that the virus is being given "ample" opportunity to morph even further into a deadlier strain that could diminish the effectiveness of vaccines.
"If we don’t crush the outbreak to the point of getting the overwhelming proportion of the population vaccinated, then what will happen is the virus will continue to smolder through the fall into the winter, giving it ample chance to get a variant," he said.
Jeffrey Rodack ✉
Jeffrey Rodack, who has nearly a half century in news as a senior editor and city editor for national and local publications, has covered politics for Newsmax for nearly seven years.
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