President Biden will update the nation on his administration’s response to the Omicron variant of COVID-19 on Monday, hours after travel restrictions targeting eight countries in southern Africa went into effect.
The president is scheduled to give remarks at 11:45 a.m. following a briefing with the White House pandemic response team, including chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci.
The White House said Biden had kept abreast of developments while in Nantucket for the Thanksgiving holiday and met with the team Sunday after returning to Washington.
According to a readout of the meeting, Fauci told the president it will take about two weeks to have “more definitive information on the transmissibility, severity and other characteristics of the variant.”
The medical team also reiterated that existing vaccines are “likely to provide a degree of protection against severe cases of COVID,” the readout said, adding that the White House recommends that Americans who are eligible receive a booster shot.
National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins said Sunday that the Omicron variant has a “record” number of mutations but claimed the vaccines should be effective.
President Biden is scheduled to address the nation around 11:45 a.m on the nature of the latest COVID-19 variant. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
President Biden (right) in the Oval Office with his chief of staff, Ron Klain (second from right), Dr. Anthony Fauci (center) and White House coronavirus response coordinator Jeff Zients (second from left). The White House“It’s clear that in all the previous examples of variants, the vaccines have worked to provide protection, and the boosters have provided especially strong protection against things like [the] Delta [strain],” Collins told “Fox News Sunday.”
“Given that history, we expect that most likely, the current vaccines will be sufficient to provide protection, and especially the boosters will give that additional layer of protection,” he said.
In an interview Monday, Fauci said the new variant, first detected in South Africa, will “inevitably” reach the US.
The White House said Biden had kept abreast of developments while in Nantucket for the Thanksgiving holiday and met with the team on Sunday after returning to Washington. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/File Photo“We have a pretty good surveillance system,” he told ABC’s “Good Morning America,” “but as we all know, when you have a virus that has already gone to multiple countries, inevitably it will be here.”
“The question is, will we be prepared for it? And the preparation that we have ongoing for what we’re doing now with the Delta variant just needs to be ramped up. And that’s the bottom line of that, is the preparation by getting more and more people vaccinated and getting the fully vaccinated boosted.”
On Monday, Japan announced it was prohibiting entry to foreign nationals, with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida calling the move “an emergency precaution to prevent a worst-case scenario in Japan.”
Israel likewise decided to bar entry to foreigners, and Morocco said it would suspend all incoming flights for two weeks starting Monday.
The US announced Friday it was restricting travel by non-US citizens from South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi.
Fauci insisted on ABC News’ “This Week” Sunday that the restrictions will give the US time to understand the new variant and “enhance our preparedness.”
However, the World Health Organization has warned against prolonged border closures, saying they often have limited effect and can wreak havoc on lives and livelihoods.
Omicron cases have been detected in several locations around the world, including Hong Kong, Australia, South America, the Netherlands, Portugal, Scotland and Canada.
With Post wires
