The director of the National Institute of Infectious Diseases of the United States, Anthony Fauci, in the press room of the White House this Thursday.JONATHAN ERNST / Reuters
Anthony Fauci, the most visible face of the Donald Trump Administration's response team to the coronavirus pandemic, returned to the White House press room on Thursday with relief.
President Joe Biden's new chief medical adviser to the White House has assured that standing on the podium and "letting science speak is a somewhat liberating feeling."
Fauci has acknowledged that episodes such as the one with hydroxychloroquine [Trump insisted on using it as a treatment] were "really uncomfortable."
He has also affirmed that if the United States manages to vaccinate 70-85% of the population by mid-summer, in the fall it could see “a degree of normality”.
The Biden Administration is the seventh with which the director of the National Institute of Infectious Diseases of the United States works.
During his term with Trump, he was criticized and contradicted on several occasions by the former Republican president.
At the beginning of the pandemic, he led daily press conferences to inform citizens about the health crisis, but for months he had not been given the microphone.
"The idea that you can come here and talk about what you know, what the evidence is, what science is ... letting science speak is a somewhat liberating feeling," he told reporters.
Pressed to assess the differences between the Republican's handling of the pandemic and Biden's first impression, the doctor acknowledged that it was "very clear" that during the Trump Administration things were said "that were really uncomfortable, because they were not based on scientific facts".
Fauci has remarked that in this Government, if someone does not know the answer, they do not make conjectures, they simply say they do not know.
"If things go wrong, not point the finger, but correct it," according to Fauci, is the attitude with which Biden's team intends to lead the crusade to tackle the virus that has killed more than 400,000 people in the US.
On his second day in the White House, Biden has announced an ambitious plan to bend the skyrocketing death curve from COVID-19, including the mandatory use of masks for those traveling on trains, planes and buses, as well as the imposing quarantines and presenting a test to travelers arriving in the United States from abroad.
Fauci has clarified that the objective of the Democratic president to vaccinate 100 million Americans in the first 100 days of Government is "very reasonable."
Subscribe here to the
newsletter
about the elections in the United States
