Americans who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 can enjoy the upcoming holiday season 'the way we’ve traditionally done it all along,' Dr. Anthony Fauci announced Sunday morning.
'I believe strongly that — particularly in the vaccinated people, if you’re vaccinated and your family members are vaccinated, those who are eligible, that is obviously very young children and not yet eligible, that you can enjoy the holidays,' the immunologist said during an interview on This Week ABC.
'You can enjoy Halloween, trick-or-treating, and certainly Thanksgiving with your family and Christmas with your family.'
Fauci argued that celebrating together is one of the main reasons health experts emphasized the importance of getting vaccinated.
His holiday recommendations come just two weeks after he said it was 'too soon' to say whether Americans can gather for Christmas.
Dr. Anthony Fauci announced Sunday that Americans who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 can celebrate the holidays together 'the way we’ve traditionally done it all along'
At that time, President Joe Biden's chief medical expert previously voiced cautious optimism about the country's COVID-19 numbers going down — however warned that the country needed to remain vigilant.
'It's just too soon to tell,' Fauci said on October 3. 'We've just got to keep concentrating on continuing to get those numbers down and not try to jump ahead by weeks or months and say what we're going to do at a particular time.'
Now, after the Center for Disease Control (CDC) released guidance Friday with recommendations on how to safely celebrate the holidays, Fauci is singing a different tune.
'It’s so important to get vaccinated, not only for your own safety, for that of your family, but also for the good of the community, to keep the level of infection down,' he told Martha Raddatz on Sunday.
'When you do that, there’s no reason at all why you can’t enjoy the holidays in a family way, the way we’ve traditionally done it all along.'
The CDC's holiday recommendations include wearing a mask indoors in areas with higher infection rates, avoiding crowded places, and staying home if you are ill are ways to help curb the spread of the virus.
They also offer special considerations for Americans who may suffer from conditions or take medicines that weaken their immune systems.
Fauci also argued that getting vaccinated is 'important, not only for your own safety, for that of your family, but also for the good of the community, to keep the level of infection down'
Also during Sunday's interview, Fauci shared that he believes Johnson & Johnson should have made their COVID-19 vaccine a two-dose shot and is encouraging Americans to get a booster for the one-jab vaccine as soon as it becomes available.
The immunologist issued the warning after a recent study found that the J&J shot's protection fell from 88 per cent in March to just three per cent in August.
'What the advisors to the FDA felt is that, given the data that they saw, very likely, this should have been a two dose vaccine to begin with,' Fauci said during a Sunday morning interview on This Week ABC.
'So the idea of making a recommendation that people who originally received J&J should receive a second dose — 18 or older with none of the restrictions about whether or not you're at a high risk or not at a high risk — is that everyone who received that first dose of J&J who are 18 and older should receive it.'
His comments came just days after a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committee unanimously voted to recommend booster shots for adult J&J recipients.
Fauci also reiterated that J&J recipients should not be concerned about the jab’s lower efficacy, in comparison to that of Pfizer or Moderna, but should instead ‘feel good’ about the booster recommendation.
He also confirmed that those who got the J&J jab could be better off by getting a booster shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, which were proven to be more effective.
'That is true, the data you refer to, that if you boost people who have originally received J&J with either Moderna or Pfizer, the level of antibodies that you induce in them is much higher than if you boost them with the original J&J,' Fauci said.
'However, you're talking about laboratory data, which very often are reflective of what you would see clinically. But the data of boosting the J&J first dose with a J&J second dose is based on clinical data. So what's going to happen is that the FDA is going to look at all those data, look at the comparison and make a determination of what they will authorize.'
He continued: 'Once an authorization is made, then the ACIP — or the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices — that advises the CDC will then make a recommendation of what people who have been receiving and have received the J&J should do.
'So it's going to be a process of authorization first and then a recommendation
