- CVS CEO Karen Lynch says the masks may be needed at least until next year.
- Lynch says the United States is on track to meet its goal of vaccinating 300 million Americans by the end of the summer.
- Fauci said Americans could still wear masks next year, depending on vaccination and case levels.
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Masks are likely to be the norm by at least 2022, said Karen Lynch, CEO of CVS Health, during the DealBook DC Policy Project conference on Tuesday.
Lynch said he hopes the masks will not be a household item forever, but added that they will probably be needed until at least next year to protect the country from the continuing COVID-19 pandemic.
“For the health and safety of the country, I think it’s important that we really think about wearing masks until this is over,” said Lynch, who started his role as CEO earlier this month. She added that getting everyone vaccinated and further studies on whether vaccinees can still carry and spread the virus are important to suspend mask rules.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden, said last week that Americans may still need to wear masks next year, depending on whether the majority of the country is vaccinated and whether COVID-19 cases are in “very low” levels. In the early days of his administration, Biden increased his vaccination ambitions and purchased enough vaccines from Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna to vaccinate 300 million Americans by the end of the summer.
CVS is one of the retail partners that worked with the federal government to bring vaccines into the arms of elderly Americans in long-term care facilities and now to vaccinate the general population. In Tuesday’s interview, Lynch said, “We are on track to fulfill what the President asked, to make 300 million Americans … And I hope that we will get there.”
So far, 13% of the population, or 44 million people, have received at least one injection of the two-dose vaccine, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This week, less than a year after the pandemic hit the United States, the country has exceeded 500,000 COVID-19-related deaths.
Meanwhile, COVID-19 hospitalizations have reached their lowest level since November, with some crediting the vaccine’s launch. Still, experts recommend the continued use of face masks and social distance measures to keep the number of hospitalizations on the decline.