United States President Joe Biden, who recently assumed presidential office, said that the country will achieve herd immunity by summer, as per media reports.
“I feel confident that by summer we’re gonna be well on our way to heading toward herd immunity,” or roughly 300 million Americans vaccinated, he said.
This comes as he promised to distribute 100 million Covid-19 vaccines within his first 100 days at White House.
Briefing media, he said on Monday, as cited in the Independent report: “Distributing vaccines to millions of Americans will be a logistical challenge that exceeds anything we’ve ever tried in this country, but I think we can do that.”
The president stressed that the administration will soon start covering people who are not “first on the list” for vaccines. This includes children.
He maintained that his government hopes to distribute up to 1.5 million doses per day “within the next three weeks or so.”
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Speculating the threshold of herd immunity, Anthony Fauci said this month that on-track vaccinations through the spring and summer could provide a “degree of protection” into the fall.
According to the John Hopkins report, over 420,000 Americans have succumbed to the Covid infection last year.
The president has asked people to wear masks all the time – doing so between now and April can save 50,000 lives, he said.
“I’m confident we will beat this, but we will still be dealing with this in the early fall,” he added.