Fauci says the U.S. should see a turning point in the pandemic ‘within a few weeks.’

April 28, 2021: -On Monday, White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said that Americans should begin seeing a turning point in the pandemic “within a few weeks.”

The U.S. has been averaging nearly 3 million Covid-19 vaccination doses per day, Fauci said.

However, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, the nation reported a seven-day average of 58,164 new Covid cases per day on Sunday. That’s down 14% compared to the previous week.

If the U.S. continues its pace of vaccinations, “within a few weeks, we’re going to see a turning around of the dynamics,” Fauci said on Monday in a virtual event hosted by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

“Not down to no infections,” said. “If you’re waiting for classic measles-like herd immunity, that’s going to be a while before we get there. But that doesn’t mean we’ll not have a major diminution in the infections happening per day and in all of the parameters, especially hospitalizations and deaths.”

The Biden administration makes Americans get vaccinated as quickly as possible as new, highly contagious variants spread.

U.S. health officials are concerned about the contagious variant, first identified in the U.K., which could stall the nation’s program ess on the pandemic. The outbreak has killed around 572,287 Americans in a little more than a year.

Still, vaccinations are being administered at a rapid pace. According to the CDC, over 139 million Americans, or 42.2% of the total U.S. population, had received one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine at least as of Sunday. According to the CDC, nearly 94.7 million people, or 28.5% of the population, are fully vaccinated.

Last week, the Biden administration announced a huge campaign to persuade more Americans, especially young people, to take the Covid-19 vaccines as supply starts to outpace demand in some of the U.S.

Fauci has said the goal is to vaccinate amid 70% and 85% of the U.S. population to achieve herd immunity and decrease the pandemic.

But he said on Monday that herd immunity is a “moving target.” The U.S. should focus on getting as many Americans vaccinated as possible, says Fauci.

“We don’t know what the durability of the infection-induced immunity is. We don’t know if someone who got infected last winter or in the early part of 2020 will be safe from a protected standpoint now,” he said.