Anthony Fauci predicts the US will 'approach some degree of normality' by the end of summer
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- Fauci told Insider that life in the US may start returning to pre-pandemic normal by the end of summer.
- After that, he said, the US could approach "a considerable degree of normality" in the winter.
- His optimism comes in part from studies that show vaccinated people are unlikely to spread the virus.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
It's the million-dollar question: When can life go back to normal?
Anthony Fauci gets asked this a lot.
"It's very difficult to predict, but I would think that we would approach some degree of normality as we get towards the end of the summer and into the fall, and a considerable degree of normality as we get into the winter of this coming year," he told Insider in a recent interview.
Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was referring specifically to life in the US. He pointed to two main factors that will determine whether his timeline is correct: "If we get the overwhelming majority of the population vaccinated, and it turns out how I suspect: that vaccinated people don't transmit."
Both of these variables are trending in a positive direction. Growing evidence shows that US-authorized shots do indeed keep vaccinated people from readily transmitting the virus, thereby stymieing its spread.
"I think ultimately, that's going to be the case," Fauci said.
As for the number of Americans getting vaccinated, and how quickly, the ramp-up has been impressive. Vaccination rates in the US doubled from February to March, then again from early March to early April. More than 3 million doses are now given daily in the US, on average, and 20% of Americans are fully vaccinated.
If enough people get vaccinated, the US could approach herd immunity
In clinical trials before their shots were authorized, Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson only showed that their vaccines prevent symptomatic COVID-19. They didn't test whether their vaccines prevent asymptomatic cases.
But of course, without curtailing symptomless infections, it's difficult to stop transmission. Now, an expanding body of research suggests that people who get the vaccines are less likely to spread the virus after all.
Still, Fauci said, "we haven't definitively proven it yet."
Studies are also increasingly showing that the shots offer protection that lasts at least six months.
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Once enough Americans get vaccinated, the US could approach herd immunity: the point at which enough people are either vaccinated or immune due to an infection to stymie the virus' overall spread. Fauci has estimated this threshold could be between 70% and 85% of the population.
"If we could just hold on for a while, we'll reach a point where the protection of the general community by the vaccine would really make it very unlikely that we're going to have another surge," he said.
If the rate of US vaccination continues to double month-over-month, the country could reach that threshold as early as June.
Already, President Biden has asked states to move the date when every American over 16 will be eligible for a vaccine up to April 19. According to a Kaiser Health News poll, the percentage of Americans who said they were hesitant to get vaccinated has halved since January. And on Friday, Pfizer asked US regulators to make its shot available to adolescents between the ages of 12 and 15, since a recent trial showed it works for that age group.
"We ultimately would like to get, and have to get, children into that mix," Fauci said during a March Senate hearing.
Fauci said the US shouldn't 'pull back prematurely'
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Determining when we'll get back to normal, of course, depends on how that's defined.
If normal means a return to nonessential travel, things are looking up: The CDC announced last week that vaccinated Americans can travel by plane, train, or bus in the US without needing to quarantine or get tested. They do need to wear masks, however.
But if normal involves a return to frequent dining at indoor restaurants, or regularly going to bars, concerts, and sporting events without much risk of coronavirus infection, that's a more complicated question.
States like New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania have already loosened coronavirus-related restrictions on gathering sizes and relaxed capacity limits at restaurants and gyms. Texas, meanwhile, eliminated capacity restrictions for all state businesses, including bars.
But all of those changes contradicted recommendations from the CDC, and the recent reopenings have coincided with spikes in cases. The rate of new infections is trending upward in 18 states.
"We're at an interesting crossroads, where we have the virus in this country plateauing at a really concerning level, more than 60,000 new infections per day," Fauci said. "So it's kind of a race between the vaccine and the possibility that there'll be another surge."
In his own life, Fauci said, he still avoids crowded, indoor places where people remove their masks, even though he's vaccinated. The CDC, too, recommends that vaccinated Americans avoid large- and medium-sized gatherings and continue to mask up. For most people, that means continuing to approach restaurants, bars, and movie theaters with a lot of caution.
Still, Fauci is optimistic about avoiding a fourth coronavirus surge, given the speed of the US vaccine rollout: "We're absolutely going in the right direction," he said.
"I think if we play it right, if we continue to vaccinate at the rate that we're vaccinating people, and we don't pull back prematurely on our mitigation, then we should be fine," Fauci added.
We may need to keep wearing masks for a while
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If being back to normal means everyone can throw away their masks, that's likely the longest timeline.
At least 18 states currently don't have mask mandates - several of them, including Texas and Mississippi, rescinded their statewide mandates last month.
But Fauci thinks masks could stick around into next year, given the overwhelming research showing how effectively masks reduce the coronavirus' spread.
When asked for a prediction about when masks will stop being the default, Fauci "didn't want to go there."
"Somebody'll come back and throw it in my face," he said.
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