As more and more Americans receive the COVID-19 vaccine, the CDC is expected to release new guidelines on what types of meetings and social interactions are safe for people who are fully vaccinated.
Being fully vaccinated means two weeks after the second dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine and two weeks after the single dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
During a meeting of the White House COVID-19 team on Friday, CDC director Rochelle Walensky again promised that more guidance for those who were vaccinated will come “soon”, but did not provide a specific date for its launch. She said the agency is taking too long to release the guidelines because it wants to ensure that Americans can act safely in accordance with those guidelines.
Doctors across the country are being asked to provide information on what patients can do once they are fully vaccinated; can they visit their grandchildren? Can they be in a crowd? Can they get some friends? Can they hug people?
“I think people need practical advice on how to make their daily lives”, Julia Marcus, an infectious disease epidemiologist at Harvard told CNN. “I think that without guidance, people can make decisions that are not informed.”
The Biden government told reporters that they have been working on these guidelines for weeks and that they should be released at any time.
No vaccine is 100% effective in preventing disease, and those who have been vaccinated can still get COVID-19, as two people recently did in Oregon, and can transmit the virus to others.
Health experts have warned that even fully vaccinated people should still wear a mask and social distance, whenever possible, to protect others and themselves.