Biden Heralds New Phase in Fight Against Covid-19: No Masks, Open Schools and In-Person Work

President Joe Biden used his first State of the Union address to give the American public and the world a clear understanding of his agenda. The first 15 minutes of the speech was dedicated to the war in Ukraine as Mr. Biden stood staunchly with the Ukrainians and announced that America and its allies would continue exacting crippling sanctions on Moscow. To that end, Mr. Biden announced that Russian aircraft would be banned from America's airspace.

But the president, keenly aware of his poor approval rating on issues related to inflation and Covid-19, also sought to project to Americans that his administration was taking the right steps to curtail rising inflation, while leading the country on a new phase in the fight against the coronavirus.

Mr. Biden stressed that while the fight against the disease continues, the strategies to combat it are now different because of progress made.

"We've reached a new moment in the fight against Covid-19 where severe cases are down to a level not seen since July of last year," he said. Speaking of the new masking guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Friday, Mr. Biden — who along with other members of Congress did not wear masks — said, "Under the new guidelines most Americans and most of the country can now go mask free, and based on projections more of the country will reach that point in the next couple of weeks."

He added, "Thanks to the progress we've made in the past year, Covid-19 no longer needs to control our lives."

On his ongoing efforts as the virus becomes an endemic, the president said, "I know some are talking about living with Covid-19, but tonight I say that we'll never accept just living with Covid-19, we'll continue to combat the virus as we do other diseases."

The president went on to announce new initiatives aimed at mitigating spread, among them continued investments in vaccines and treatment, including Pfizer's antiviral pill which will be part of the newly announced Test to Treat Initiative "so people can get tested at a pharmacy and if they test positive receive the anti-viral pill on the spot at not cost," Mr. Biden said as Democrats applauded.

Governor Albert Bryan on Monday announced major changes to his administration's Covid-19 guidelines aimed at ushering in a new normal that sees the territory reverting to pre-pandemic norms while keeping safeguards in place to quickly respond to potential outbreaks. But the governor kept the masking mandate in place for the time being, telling the Consortium, "the CDC has been wrong before."