As COVID-19 Cases Fall, Pandemic Expert Urges Americans To 'Take The Lessons Of This Seriously'

The U.S. has encouraging news to celebrate: 50% of American adults are fully vaccinated and nearly two-thirds have a single dose, putting the country closer to President Biden’s goal of 70% by early July.

While COVID-19 cases are dropping and vaccines are working better than originally imagined, “that does not by any means indicate that we're out of the woods or that everything can go back to exactly the way it was in, say, September 2019,” Garrett points out.

Many states have ended, or are close to ending, pandemic-related restrictions.

Although many Americans are itching to get back to normalcy, Garrett cautions to use “common sense” as the country reopens and concerning variants continue to spread. And she says to keep in mind that the rest of the world does not have high vaccination rates like the U.S.

“I think we're tempting fate if as Americans,” she says, “we just jump right off that cliff and go right back as if the whole world was our oyster.”