Vaccines await full approval
Biden adviser Fauci says he’s hopeful FDA will act soon
WILMINGTON, Del. — The U.S. government’s top infectious-disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said Sunday that he was hopeful the Food and Drug Administration will give full approval to the coronavirus vaccine by month’s end and predicted the potential move will spur a wave of vaccine mandates in the private sector as well as schools and universities.
The FDA has only granted emergency-use approval of the Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, but the agency is expected to soon give full approval to Pfizer.
The Biden administration has stated that the federal government will not mandate vaccinations beyond the federal workforce, but is increasingly urging state and
local governments as well as businesses to consider such mandates. Fauci, who is President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, said “mandates at the local level need to be done” to help curb the spread of the virus.
“I hope — I don’t predict — I hope that it will be within the next few weeks. I hope it’s within the month of August,” Fauci said of FDA approval of the vaccine. “If that’s the case, you’re going to see the empowerment of local enterprises, giving mandates that could be colleges, universities, places of business, a whole variety and I strongly support that. The time has come. … We’ve got to go the extra step to get people vaccinated.”
Fauci’s comments on NBC’s “Meet the Press” come as the Biden administration is weighing what levers it can push to encourage more unvaccinated Americans to get their shots as the delta variant continues to surge through much of the U.S.
Biden recently approved rules requiring federal workers to provide proof of vaccination or face regular testing, mask mandates and travel restrictions. Biden is also awaiting a formal recommendation from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on potentially requiring U.S. troops to get vaccinated.
The administration has become more vocal in its support of vaccine mandates at a moment when high-profile companies have informed employees that coronavirus vaccination requirements are in the works, and some localities have adopted or are contemplating vaccine requirements to dine indoors.
United Airlines informed its employees that they will need to be fully vaccinated by Oct. 25 or five weeks after the FDA grants full approval to one of the vaccines — whichever date comes first.
Disney and Walmart have announced vaccine mandates for white-collar workers, and Microsoft, Google and Facebook said they will require proof of vaccination for employees and visitors to their U.S. offices. Tyson Foods has also announced it will require all U.S. employees to get vaccinated by November.
There’s also been pushback.
The U.S. Supreme Court last week was asked to block a plan by Indiana University to require students and employees to get vaccinated against covid-19. It’s the first time the high court has been asked to weigh in on a vaccine mandate.
Randi Weingarten, president of American Federation of Teachers union, said on “Meet the Press” that she personally supports a vaccine mandate for educators.
“As a matter of personal conscience, I think that we need to be working with our employers — not opposing them on vaccine mandates,” said Weingarten, who estimated about 90% of the union’s members are already vaccinated.
Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday all but endorsed vaccine mandates, saying, “I celebrate when I see businesses deciding that they’re going to mandate that for their employees.”
“Yes, I think we ought to use every public health tool we can when people are dying,” Collins said.
BOOSTER SHOTS
Fauci also said he’s “strongly in favor” of speeding booster shots to people with weakened immune systems, as the delta variant continues to shift the strategies for curbing the pandemic.
“We need to look at them in a different light,” Fauci said on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” on Sunday. “We will almost certainly be boosting those people before we boost the general population that’s been vaccinated, and we should be doing that reasonably soon.”
Fauci spoke as debate grows over “breakthrough” infections among fully vaccinated people and whether approval should be given for booster shots. Israel, the first nation to roll out boosters widely, said it expects more than half a million people aged 60 and over will get a third injection by the end of Sunday.
Fauci said most people who have compromised immune systems, including those with organ transplants or who are on chemotherapy, “never did get an adequate response” from their covid-19 vaccination.
In San Francisco, anyone who received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine can get a supplemental dose of Pfizer Inc. or Moderna Inc.’s shots at city-run sites, if they wish to do so after consulting with their doctor, according to the city’s Department of Public Health.
Health officials don’t take breakthrough infections “lightly,” Fauci said. More testing is needed in order to understand the exact scope of breakthrough cases, he said on “Meet the Press.”
When asked if other groups should get booster shots, Fauci said the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is ready to give a recommendation as soon as it sees clear evidence to do so from the data.
The CDC has been tracking various groups including the elderly, those in nursing homes and young people month by month, he said. “As soon as they see that level of durability of protection goes down, then you will see the recommendation to vaccinate those individuals.”
But, he stressed: “The vaccines are still doing what you originally want them to do — to keep you out of the hospital to prevent you from getting seriously ill.”
MASK MANDATES
Businesses large and small, from McDonald’s and Home Depot to local yoga studios, are reinstituting mask mandates as U.S. coronavirus cases rise. Bars, gyms and restaurants across the country are requiring vaccinations to get inside.
After a largely maskfree summer, the reversal has been brought on by the fast-spreading delta variant and new guidance from the CDC. But business owners and workers say they will do what they can to keep their doors open and not slow the economic gains of the last few months.
“We’ve already been through the worst of the challenges when we shut down the indoors last year,” said Brack May, the chef and owner of Cowbell, a New Orleans burger joint. “Let’s just get ahead of the curve here.”
May recently began requiring customers to show their vaccine cards for indoor dining. He said he wants to protect his workers, who are required to be vaccinated but have young children at home, as well as his neighborhood, where some musicians recently contracted the coronavirus.
May expects that eventually, vaccine rules like his will be commonplace. Next month, New York City will start requiring vaccinations to enter restaurants, gyms and theaters.
But for now, customers are far more likely to encounter mask mandates. After lifting mask recommendations for fully vaccinated people in May, the CDC reversed course in late July, recommending masks for both vaccinated and unvaccinated people in areas of higher transmission.
The shifting guidance has caused confusion over which rules to enforce and how. Walmart and Target, for instance, recently began requiring masks for employees — but not customers — in areas where virus transmission rates are high. McDonald’s is requiring masks for both employees and customers. Home Depot’s mask mandate is nationwide.
A handful of places, like Louisiana, the San Francisco Bay area and Las Vegas, are mandating masks indoors.
BUSINESSES DIVIDED
Many business owners didn’t wait for the CDC or their local governments before acting. In mid-July, Tamra Patterson reinstituted a mask mandate and reduced seating capacity from 200 to 65 at Chef Tam’s Underground Cafe, the restaurant she owns in Memphis.
“I need every dollar and dime and penny I can get, but if I don’t have employees healthy, I don’t have a business. If customers are sick, I have nothing,” Patterson said.
Not every business supports the mandates. Basilico’s Pasta e Vino, a restaurant in Huntington Beach, Calif., has railed against masks on social media. A sign on its door requires patrons to prove that they’re unvaccinated.
Some workers also don’t want to see masks return.
Dru W., a grocery employee in Houston who asked not to use his full name for fear of reprisals at work, said he was fully vaccinated months ago and enjoys the freedom it gives him to go without a mask. Few stores around him are enforcing the new CDC guidelines, he said, and he won’t either.
“I didn’t get both my doses and deal with the rather gnarly side effects only to be told to go back to the way things were during the pandemic,” he said.
The new wave of mandates give some comfort to companies that never gave up on masks, even when U.S. cases ebbed earlier this summer.
Liz Manasek, the co-owner of Warner Bodies, a custom truck manufacturer in Elwood, Ind., kept a mask policy in place after watching other companies struggle with different rules for vaccinated and unvaccinated workers.
About 60% of the company’s 105 employees are now vaccinated, she said. She has told employees she won’t consider removing the mandate until that level reaches 80%.
Manasek has gotten some pushback from workers, but she reminds them that the policy has been effective. Only one or two employees have tested positive for covid-19 since the pandemic began, she said.
“We’ve just got to hold out and keep on the basics,” she said.