(Reuters) – A more contagious variant of COVID-19 that has swept the UK has been reported in at least five US states, National Institutes of Health director Francis Collins said in an interview with the Washington Post on Wednesday .
“We’ve now seen the same UK virus in the US in at least five states and I would be surprised if that doesn’t grow quickly,” Collins said, adding that, however, it doesn’t seem to be more serious.
Last week, Reuters reported that Florida became the third known U.S. state to identify the case, with two more cases identified in Colorado and California.
Scientists have said that newly developed vaccines should be equally effective against both variants.
The NIH director said he expects vaccinations to be given through pharmacies as soon as the country can cope with an increase in cases, and the number of vaccinations will be much lower than the initial targets.
He said in the interview that at least 80% -85% of Americans should receive the vaccine to achieve “herd immunity.” (bit.ly/3opexFt)
U.S. chief infectious disease specialist Dr. Anthony Fauci said in a separate interview that it was unclear what percentage of the population should be vaccinated for herd immunity.
“I had originally said 70%, now according to my estimate, it’s probably between 70% and 85%,” Fauci said in an interview with the Economic Club of Washington, DC on Wednesday.
“We need to vaccinate enough people so that the dynamics of the outbreak slow down drastically,” he added. “I don’t think that’s going to happen until late summer or early fall, if we do it right.”
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said they had administered more than 4.8 million first doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the country as of Tuesday morning and had distributed more than 17 million doses.
Reports from Vishwadha Chander to Bengaluru; Edited by Arun Koyyur and Shounak Dasgupta