美国最高传染病专家安东尼·福奇(Anthony Fauci)博士周五预测，美国人最早要到明年年中才会恢复正常，这是他最近与唐纳德·特朗普(Donald Trump)总统不和的几项声明之一。
福奇说:“如果你说的是回到正常的程度，类似于我们在COVID之前的状态，那将会持续到2021年，甚至可能是2021年底。”讲述MSNBC的安德里亚·米切尔。
福奇补充说:“我相信我们将在今年年底，也就是明年年初，研制出一种疫苗。”。“但当你动员疫苗分发，让大多数或更多的人接种疫苗并得到保护时，这可能要到2021年年中或年底才会发生。”
2020年6月26日，华盛顿，国家过敏和传染病研究所所长安东尼·福奇博士(Anthony Fauci)在与冠状病毒特别工作组成员的新闻发布会上发言。
福西还对特朗普关于该国正在“扭转局面”的新描述提出异议，而是称当前的数据趋势“令人不安”。
“当你淡化真正构成威胁的东西时，那不是一件好事，”福奇说，回应特朗普对记者鲍勃·伍德沃德的承认，即他故意将病毒的危险降至最低，以免“制造恐慌”。
周四，与总统乐观的前景相反，福奇在哈佛论坛上说，“我只是认为我们需要静观其变，度过这个秋天和冬天，因为这并不容易。我们知道每次我们限制，我们取消限制，我们得到一个信号。我的意思是……是打地鼠。”
几天后他发表了声明法宝再次暗示疫苗将会在11月3日的总统选举之前出现选举。
特朗普周一在白宫新闻发布会上告诉记者:“我们很快就会有疫苗，甚至可能在一个非常特殊的日期之前。”“你知道我说的是什么日子。”
“特殊日期”还有不到两个月，而且民意调查显示特朗普对他处理的流行病有很高的不赞成数字，疫苗的早期可用性可能有助于他的连任竞选。
当被问及他最近的竞选集会时——支持者在外面，但大多挤在一起，很少戴面具——福奇说特朗普的支持者可能不安全。
“仅仅因为你在户外并不意味着你受到了保护，尤其是当你在人群中并且没有戴口罩的时候，”福奇周五说。
他说:“我们真的需要勇往直前，尽我们所能来控制这场疫情。”。
尽管民主党人对特朗普是否在疫苗批准过程中施加政治压力表示担忧，但他指责民主党人在疫苗问题上也玩“危险”的政治，这表明他们正在破坏公众对最终疫苗的信任。
周五，福奇说，“当你面对一种政治氛围时，这就变得更加困难。”
高风险的政治氛围使食品和药物管理局陷入困境，人们开始质疑该机构是否是一个真正独立的公共卫生机构。
周四，食品和药物管理局局长斯蒂芬·哈恩坚持认为，食品和药物管理局关于新冠肺炎疫苗的决定将基于临床试验的科学和数据，而不是政治影响。
哈恩说:“我可以告诉你，在这场大流行期间，在我担任专员的整个任期内，我没有改变职业科学家在医疗产品上的决定，我现在也无意这样做。”他后来补充说，“我们将独立地称之为球和罢工。”
哈恩承认，食品和药物管理局将被批评为行动“太快或太慢”，但最终，他说，他“对职业科学家完全有信心”。
在这张档案照片中，美国食品和药物管理局局长斯蒂芬·哈恩于2020年6月30日在华盛顿特区DC国会山的参议院卫生、教育、劳工和养老金委员会听证会上作证
其他直接研究疫苗候选人的公共卫生官员试图传递这样一个信息，即政治与这一过程无关，他们说，如果人们不信任疫苗，那么它就不会有效，因为绝大多数美国人需要它来阻止病毒。
负责确保药物和疫苗安全的生物制品评估和研究中心的美国食品和药物管理局官员彼得·马克斯(Peter Marks)周五表示，他的同事计划尽可能透明，以克服对疫苗安全性的任何怀疑。
马克斯在杜克大学的一次活动中说:“当我们在食品和药物管理局做事情时，他们最终都集中在这样一个事实上，即我们必须确保我们有一种安全有效的疫苗，人们会足够信任并愿意服用。”
“因为这是绝对关键的，我们把我们听到的所有噪音放在一边，有各种各样的不和谐的声音，等等，疫苗，等等，等等，糟糕的等等，”他说。
“不，我们需要让这种不和谐的声音消失。我们需要知道食品和药物管理局有科学家...这些人致力于确保通过这个过程得到的东西对他们自己的家庭来说足够安全。他们希望每个人的家庭都安全，就像他们自己的家庭一样。那些人有着难以置信的承诺。马克斯说:“让人们知道这一点非常重要。
马克斯是美国食品和药物管理局的几名高级官员之一，他们在另一项恢复公众对该机构信心的努力中，写了一篇专栏文章今日美国周四，重申他们在决策时依赖科学和数据的承诺。
官员们写道:“我们完全理解，美国食品和药物管理局和其他联邦行政机构一样，是在政治环境中运作的。”。“这是一个现实，我们必须在保持独立性的同时，娴熟地应对这一现实，以确保公共卫生取得尽可能好的结果。”
“然而，美国食品和药物管理局的基本原则仍然是坚定不移的:保护和促进美国公众的健康和福祉，并将我们支持公共卫生使命的决定建立在健全的科学基础上，”他们说。
Fauci at odds with Trump: Downplaying virus threat 'not a good thing,' no 'normal' until at least mid-2021
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top expert on infectious diseases, predicted Friday that Americans won't be going back to anything like normal until the middle of next year at the earliest, one of several recent statements putting him at odds with President Donald Trump.
“If you're talking about getting back to a degree of normality which resembles where we were prior to COVID, it's going to be well into 2021, maybe even towards the end of 2021," FaucitoldMSNBC's Andrea Mitchell.
"I believe that we will have a vaccine that will be available by the end of this year, the beginning of next year," Fauci added. "But by the time you mobilize the distribution of the vaccinations and you get the majority or more of the population vaccinated and protected, that's likely not going to happen till the mid – or end – of 2021."
Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci, center, speaks during a news conference with members of the Coronavirus task force in Washington, June 26, 2020.
Fauci also took issue with Trump's new characterization that the country is "rounding the corner," instead calling current data trends "disturbing."
"When you downplay something that is really a threat, that's not a good thing," Fauci said, responding to Trump's admission to journalist Bob Woodward that he intentionally minimized the danger from the virus so as not to "create panic."
On Thursday, in contrast to the president's rosy outlook, Fauci told a Harvard forum, “I just think we need to hunker down and get through this fall and winter, because it’s not going to be easy. We know every time we restrict, we lift restrictions, we get a blip. I mean … it’s whack-a-mole.”
His statements come days afterTrumponce again suggested that a vaccine would come before the Nov. 3 presidentialelection.
“We’re going to have a vaccine very soon, maybe even before a very special date,” Trump told reporters during a White House news conference on Monday. “You know what date I’m talking about.”
That "special date" is less than two months away, andpollsshowing Trump has high disapproval numbers for he's handled the pandemic, the early availability of a vaccine could help his reelection campaign.
When asked about his recent campaign rallies – where supporters are outside but mostly packed together, with few wearing masks – Fauci said Trump's supporters may not be safe.
"Just because you're outdoors does not mean that you're protected, particularly if you're in a crowd and you're not wearing masks," Fauci said on Friday.
"We really need to forge ahead and do everything we can to contain this outbreak," he said.
While Democrats raise concerns over whether Trump is putting political pressure on the vaccine approval process, he's accused Democrats of playing "dangerous" politics with the vaccine as well, suggesting they are undermining the public's trust in an eventual vaccine.
On Friday, Fauci said "when you're dealing with a political atmosphere, it makes it that much more difficult."
The high-stakes political atmosphere has put the Food and Drug Administration in the hot seat, with questions being raised about whether the agency is a truly independent public health authority.
On Thursday, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn insisted that the FDA's decisions on a COVID-19 vaccine will be made based on the science and data from clinical trials, rather than political influence.
"I can tell you throughout this pandemic, throughout my tenure as commissioner, I have not reversed a decision by the career scientists on medical products, and I have no intention of doing that now," Hahn said. He later added, “we will independently call the balls and strikes."
Hahn conceded the FDA will be criticized for either moving “too fast or too slow,” but, ultimately, he said, he is “completely confident in the career scientists.”
undefined
In this file photo, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn testifies before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington DC on June 30, 2020, in Washington, D.C.
Other public health officials working directly on the vaccine candidates are trying to send the message that politics has nothing to do with the process, saying that if people don't trust a vaccine when it's available, then it won't be effective, because the vast majority of Americans need to get it to stop the virus.
Peter Marks, the FDA official in charge of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research that ensures safety of drugs and vaccines, said Friday his colleagues plan to be as transparent as possible to overcome any doubts about a vaccine's safety.
"As we do things at FDA, they're all focused ultimately, around the fact that we have to make sure that we have a safe and effective vaccine that people will trust enough to want to take," Marks said at an event with Duke University.
"Because it's just absolutely critical that we put aside all of the noise that we've been hearing and there's all sorts of cacophony about blah, blah, blah, vaccine, blah, blah, bad blah, blah, blah, blah, blah," he said.
"No, we need to get that that cacophony needs to go away. We need to understand that there are scientists here at FDA ...These people are so committed to making sure that what comes through this process is safe enough for their own families. And they want they want it to be safe for everyone's family, just like for their own family. And those people are have that incredible commitment. It's really important that people know that is going to be out there," Marks said.
Marks is one of several senior FDA officials, who, in another effort to restore public confidence in the agency, penned an op-ed inUSA Todayon Thursday, restating their commitment to rely on science and data when making decisions.
“We absolutely understand that the FDA, like other federal executive agencies, operates in a political environment,” the officials wrote. “That is a reality that we must navigate adeptly while maintaining our independence to ensure the best possible outcomes for public health.”
“The foundational and fundamental principles of the FDA, however, remain steadfast: to protect and promote the health and well-being of the American public, and to base our decisions in support of our public health mission on sound science,” they said.
