Anthony Stephen Fauci, Andrew M. Slavitt, Rochelle Paula Walensky

“ We must continue to be vigilant and committed to consistently taking the steps we — work to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Where the pandemic goes from here is dependent on our collective behavior and resolve to do our part to protect ourselves, our families, and our communities.
Together, we have the capacity to avoid another surge in our nation. I know people are tired; they want to get back to life, to normal. ”

“ There is so much more to do, but one thing that has become clear is that while none of us on our own could defeat COVID-19, all of us working together can. And today I want to highlight what people across America can contribute to this cause at this critical time.
From day one, President Biden has been pulling the country together to unify against the virus. This begins with Congress. We cannot defeat this virus as rapidly as we need to without action from Congress. ”

“ Just as Congress is taking action, so too are the nation’s private and civil sectors and the small and large companies that are at the heart of our economy and provide jobs to so many.
One of the benefits of being and providing honest and clear communication with the public about the challenges we face are all of the people who raise their hands and offer to help. ”

“ What is important and what I want to cover today is that any progress is a result of the hard work of many — people and entities working together for the greater good: vaccine manufacturers, Pfizer and Moderna; distribution partners at McKesson, FedEx, and UPS; governors, mayors, county officials, and their health departments; the thousands of providers, pharmacies, and members of the military; FEMA; and other states and federal employees that had been part of this vaccination effort. ”

“ Since January 20th, we have been engaging in literally hundreds of conversations with hundreds of companies who are eager to help put an end to COVID-19, get people safely back to work, rehire workers, and grow the economy, as the President outlined in his national strategy to defeat COVID-19. ”

“ What will it take to get out of the woods? Can you please be specific as to, scientifically, what the conditions will be for us to try to approach what used to be called “normal”? And please, please be as specific as you can. What exactly are we looking for? DR. FAUCI: Yeah, we’re looking at the curve that Dr. Walensky showed — unfortunately, it looks like it’s, kind of, stopped there at around 70,000 — to go all the way down so that the test positivity is well less than 10 percent, when you really are in the blue zone throughout the entire country. ”

“ This legislation will enable Americans across the country to defeat COVID-19 and get back to normal life more quickly. The bill is critical to allowing us to do some things that we all need to do to defeat this virus: needed funding to make schools safer to open; the ability to stay ahead of the virus as it mutates by funding greater sequencing; testing and tracing to contain outbreaks and stay ahead of new variants; addressing supply shortages; investing in high-quality treatments for people with COVID-19; providing paid sick leave and other support to contain the spread of the virus ”

“ Walensky. And thank you all for your questions and for tuning in today. We are — I’ll say again, we are appreciative of the efforts of so many across the country to help us in this war against COVID-19.I want to just finish perhaps on the note that both Doctors Walensky and Dr. Fauci emphasize, which is: We are not there by a longshot. The progress we’ve made is better than where we were weeks ago, but it is nowhere near the baseline that we need to achieve as a country, and that’s going to take all of us working together. ”

“ In the time since the President has taken office, we’ve now doubled the pace of vaccinations and are rapidly on our way to vaccinating many of the people most at risk of dying or being hospitalized from COVID-19, with nearly one in five adults and nearly half of Americans over 65 having received their first shot. ”

“ But out of an abundance of caution, you want to at least start off and show the proof of principle that you can get a vaccine that can induce a considerable amount of immune response in the form of antibodies certainly, and possibly T cells, that can address the specific variant. ”

“ Ford and The Gap are producing and donating millions of masks. Professional sports leagues and the live events industry have offered their more than 100 stadiums and venues to local communities to be used as vaccination sites. Retailers like Best Buy, Target, and Dollar General all are giving more than a half a million workers paid time off or compensating employees who get vaccinated. Uber, PayPal, and Walgreens are teaming up to provide $10 million worth of free rides to vaccination sites. ”

“ Since we’ve arrived, we have had over 250 conversations with business leaders in sectors as diverse as technology, retail, social media, medical products, airlines, health insurance, hospitals, utilities, and we’re having more every day. ”

“ Just because a company, as you say, makes a vaccine — I mean, I’m sorry, I say “vaccine”; I mean test. Just because a company makes a test and just because people need a test doesn’t mean that they’re automatically finding one another. So this is an initiative we’d be happy to provide you more details about.
Next question.
MODERATOR: Next we’ll go to Sheryl Stolberg at the New York Times. Q Hi, thank you for taking this question. I’m wondering if you could elaborate, Andy, on the initiatives with respect to the masks and also the Uber rides. How will people get access to the rides? ”

“ When that happens, you’ll not only have the curve specifically go down to that very, very low baseline, but you’ll have more and more people that will keep it at that baseline because the virus will not have a real free rein to essentially infect anybody that the virus wants to infect. ”

“ I mean, we understand there is tendency, given that the deflection of the curve is down, to get back to a situation where you’re approaching normal, because everybody is under the stress and strain of the long duration of this. ”

“ And Lyft is partnering with CVS and the YMCA to provide 60 million free or discounted rides to vaccination sites.
In both of these efforts, we are encouraging organizations to target the benefits to people who need them the most so communities hit hardest bounce back. CVS has also agreed to improved access and appointment times for people looking for vaccines and special efforts to reserve vaccine appointments. This is critical to health equity. ”

“ So today, the administration is announcing a new partnership with America’s leading business organizations to enlist the full force of the private sector to defeat COVID-19 with a call to action. The Biden administration is joining with the Chamber of Commerce; leaders of the black, Latino, and Asian business community ”

“ I would present these as efforts by organizations around the country that we are encouraging and we are highlighting, and we are encouraging others to take stock of. In some cases, we have been — in all of these cases, we’ve been making it very clear, as companies have asked, “Where are the needs?” But we are not directing these masks.So unlike what we announced on Wednesday — which is that we will be distributing masks directly to food pantries and to homeless shelters — in this particular case, these are masks that are being distributed by the company. ”

“ And while deaths tend to fluctuate more than cases and hospital admissions, the most recent seven-day average — approximately 2,000 per day — is slightly higher than the seven-day average earlier in the week. ”