Fauci touts vaccinations: ‘This is not going to last forever’

Anthony Fauci is urging Americans to continue following COVID-19 guidelines amid warnings of a new surge in cases and the U.S.’s rollout of three vaccines for the virus.

Speaking with  Jim Acosta on “CNN Newsroom” on Saturday, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases implored Americans to remember that Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines are only temporary and would be relaxed as more Americans are vaccinated and rates of new infections drop as a result.

“People say, ‘Well, you just want to confine us forever.’ No, this is not going to last forever, because every day that you get four million, three million people vaccinated, you get closer and closer to control,” Fauci told CNN.

“Four million people vaccinated [in a day] is really a lot of people,” he added, referring to a figure just above the current U.S. vaccination rate. “If you multiply that by 30 days in a month, you’ve got 120 million vaccinations that you’ve done. That is what you need to get your arms around this outbreak and to prevent additional deaths, additional hospitalizations, additional infections.”

Health officials including CDC Director Rochelle Walensky have warned that a new surge of infections is on the way with many U.S. states relaxing restrictions on public life. The rate of new COVID-19 infections ticked up toward the end of March, but has yet to approach anything near the surge encountered by officials over the fall and winter.

President Biden has also urged Americans to continue following social distancing and masking guidelines in the face of relaxed state restrictions across the country. 

“Too many Americans are acting as if this fight is over,” he said on Friday.