President Joe Biden on Tuesday said he hopes that the United States, the country hit hardest by the Covid-19 pandemic, would be normal by the same time next year.
"When do I think things will get back to normal? I've been cautioned not to give an answer to that because we don't know for sure. But my hope is, by this time next year, we're going to be back to normal," Biden told reporters at the White House.
But a lot is yet to be done, he said.
"But again, it depends upon if people continue to be smart and understand that we still can have significant losses. There's a lot we have to do yet," Biden said.
The United States has lost 5,11,839 lives so far due to Covid-19.
Biden on Tuesday announced measures to increase the production of Covid-19 vaccines and accelerate process of vaccinating Americans.
"We're increasing the places where people can get vaccinated. We've sent millions of vaccines to over 7,000 pharmacies to make it easier for folks to get their Covid-19 vaccine shot like they would their flu shot," he said.
"The federal government is also working with states to set up hundreds of mass vaccination centres in places like stadiums, community centres, parking lots that vaccinate thousands of people per day. My wife Jill and I just visited one in Houston last week. It's incredible," Biden said.
So far three vaccines have received emergency use authorisation.
"With this increased production of three safe and effective vaccines, we have an opportunity to help address the urgent national need more quickly and getting our schools back open safely.
"We should all be encouraged by this news of a third safe and highly effective Covid-19 vaccine. The more people who get vaccinated, the faster we're going to overcome this virus and get back to our loved ones, get our economy back on track, and start to move back to normal," he said.
"One of my first goals, when I got into office, was to say that there will be 100 million vaccination shots administered in my first 100 days in office. We've got halfway to that goal in 37 days, and I feel confident we'll make it all the way," he said.
"We have a long way to go, but, we're going to use every resource of the federal government to make it happen," he added.
Biden said this is a national imperative that they get the kids back into the classroom safely and as soon as possible.
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