The U.S. has now vaccinated more than 100 million people with at least one dose of COVID-19 shots, a historic milestone in effort to end the pandemic.
Almost a third of American adults now have or will soon have some degree of protection against COVID-19.
About 17.5 percent of Americans are now fully vaccinated against coronavirus, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) vaccination tracker.
The U.S. had already administered 100 shots well before President Biden’s initial goal of 100 million shots given in his firs 100 days in office. Now, Biden has raised the stakes of that modest goal and wants to get 200 million ‘shots in arms’ by the same date, April 30.
With just under a month to go, and nearly three million shots being given day, that goal will likely be achieved. To-date more than 157.6 shots have been administered in the U.S.
Keeping this quick pace up will be essential to ending the pandemic in the U.S. as cases have ticked up 17 percent in the past week, driven by the rising prevalence of more infectious variants.
The U.S. has now vaccinated more than 100 million people with at least one dose of COVID-19 shots, a historic milestone in effort to end the pandemic, and is giving nearly 3 million shots a day
As vaccination rates pick up, the CDC announced it now considers travel ‘low risk’ for fully vaccinated people to travel, despite director Dr Rochelle Walensky’s warning on Monday that she had a ‘feeling of impending doom’ over the rising U.S. infection rates (left). President Biden’s initial aim of getting 100 million shots in arms in the first 100 days of his term was a modest one, reached last month (right)
According to Bloomberg tracking, the US administered 3.4 million doses on Thursday and is on track to hit four million doses today.
Just shy of 58 million Americans are now fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the CDC’s data.
Although two-thirds of the U.S. population are completely unvaccinated, the pace of the rollout has picked up dramatically.
It puts the U.S. on track to reach herd immunity – with 75 percent of the population vaccinated – in four months.
But the 30 percent mark is particularly significant.
Daily infection rates tend to start declining precipitously after countries reach this mark in their vaccination campaigns.
It’s a pattern seen in Israel, the Maldives, Seychelles and the United Arab Emirates, according to Bloomberg’s tracking.
And the U.S. needs to see trends turn in that direction.
Currently, the U.S. is seeing more than 66,000 new infections a day, a DailyMail.com analysis of Johns Hopkins University data shows.
Although this seven-day rolling average of new cases is only about a third the figure seen in January, at the height of the pandemic in the U.S., it’s enough to have CDC director Dr Rochelle Walensky ‘scared,’ and left with a ‘feeling of impending doom,’ she said on Friday.
Cases are up between 14 and 17 percent compared to last week, and new daily infections are on the rise in at least 30 states.
Experts believe that these increases are driven by states with few restrictions, lower rates of vaccination and a high prevalence of Covid variants.
States with lagging vaccination campaigns could offer a window of opportunity for the virus to resurge.
Alabama, for example, has only vaccinated 24.7 percent of its population with one or more dose, well behind the U.S. rate.
But even states that lag furthest behind the national vaccination rate are beginning to close the gap as the rollout gathers steam and the supply being shipped increases.
This week, a record 20 million shots were given in the U.S., White House Covid response team officials announced during a Friday briefing.
It comes as the CDC said Americans who are fully vaccinated can safely travel both domestically and internationally.
Fully vaccinated people of any nationality arriving to the U.S. from other countries no longer have to quarantine upon arrival, and Americans can leave the U.S. without testing negative before boarding an international fight.
A negative test result will still be required for people of all nationalities flying to the U.S. from international locations, including Americans returning to the U.S. from abroad. People arriving to the U.S. should still get a test within three to five days of arrival, the CDC said.
People traveling internationally from the U.S. to other countries may still need to test or quarantine, depending on the destination country’s guidelines.
However, the Trump administration rule barring travelers from China, Iran, the UK, Ireland, Brazil, South Africa and parts of Europe from entering the U.S. is still in place, with exceptions for some essential business travel.
And while the CDC can make national recommendations for what it deems scientifically safe, the agency has no power of enforcement.
