White House Defends Biden’s ‘Pandemic is Over’ Comment Despite Criticisms

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The White House on Tuesday defended President Joe Biden’s remarks that the COVID-19 pandemic is “over.”

“The president said – and he was very clear in his ‘60 Minutes’ interview – that COVID remains a problem, and we're fighting it,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters. “We have to continue to make sure that we are fighting this once-in-a-generation pandemic.”

Jean-Pierre said that Biden was acknowledging the “massive amount of progress” his administration has made on the COVID-19 pandemic, citing vaccines and treatments. She did not, however, repeat Biden’s statement that the pandemic is over.

“Just think about where we were when this president walked into this administration, where again, a response to this once-in-a-generation pandemic was mismanaged by the last administration,” Jean-Pierre said in a criticism of the Trump administration. “Now we are in a place where it is a lot more manageable.”

 

The Associated Press

 

Biden in the interview that aired on Sunday stated that the pandemic is over, citing a decline in mask-wearing and saying people are in “pretty good shape.”

“The pandemic is over,” Biden said. “We still have a problem with COVID. We're still doing a lot of work on it, but the pandemic is over. If you notice, no one's wearing masks. Everybody seems to be in pretty good shape.”

Biden’s comments have prompted criticisms from public health experts and Republicans alike – although for different reasons.

His statement comes as more than 2,500 Americans are dying of COVID-19 on average each week, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

 

It’s a number that health experts among the Biden administration agree is too high.

“We are not where we need to be if we’re going to be able to, quote, ‘live with the virus,’ because we know we’re not going to eradicate it,” leading infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci said at an event on Monday.

 

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