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Biden says Covid ‘pandemic is over’, despite US daily death toll in the hundreds
US President Joe Biden said in an interview on Sunday (Sep 18) that the Covid pandemic in the United States is over.
"The pandemic is over. We still have a problem with Covid. We're still doing a lot of work on it..., but the pandemic is over," Biden told CBS news programme "60 Minutes" in an interview taped as he walked the floor of the Detroit Auto Show last week.
“If you notice, no one is wearing masks,” Biden said, gesturing around the hall.
The remarks were indicative of the current state of much of US society, given that Covid restrictions have been largely lifted nationwide and travel has returned to pre-pandemic levels.
Last week the World Health Organization declared the end of the pandemic was “in sight”, after revealing that weekly deaths were at the lowest level since March 2020.
However, it cautioned that coronavirus still posed an “acute global emergency” and highlighted that during the first eight months of 2022 more than 1 million people died from Covid-19.
In the US, the toll of the pandemic has diminished significantly since early in Biden’s term when more than 3,000 Americans a day were dying, as enhanced care, medications and vaccinations have become more widely available.
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But nearly 400 people a day continue to die from Covid in the US, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Biden has asked Congress for $22.4bn more in funding to prepare for a potential case surge in the fall.
Biden spent more than two weeks isolating in the White House after two bouts of Covid, starting in July. His wife, Jill, contracted the virus in August. Biden has said the mild cases were a testament to the improvements in care during his presidency.
levantnews-theguardian
