Q: We’re heading into the winter months. You could social distance in a restaurant or in an indoor gathering. But would you feel OK being in there without a mask?
If we’re in the hot zone the way we are now, where there’s so many infections around, I would feel quite uncomfortable even being in a restaurant. And particularly if it was at full capacity.
Q: I see you’ve been getting your hair cut. What do you think about hair salons?
I mean, again, it depends. I used to get a haircut every five weeks. I get a haircut every 12 weeks now — with a mask on me, as well as a mask on the person who’s cutting the hair, for sure.
Q: Transportation? Trains? Planes? Metro? Where are we at the moment?
It depends on your individual circumstances. If you are someone who is in the highest risk category, as best as possible, don’t travel anywhere. Or if you go someplace, you have a car, you’re in your car by yourself, not getting on a crowded subway, not getting on a crowded bus or even flying in an airplane. If you’re a 25-year-old who has no underlying conditions, that’s much different.
Q: Bars?
Bars are really problematic. I have to tell you, if you look at some of the outbreaks that we’ve seen, it’s when people go into bars, crowded bars. You know, I used to go to a bar. I used to like to sit at a bar and grab a hamburger and a beer. But when you’re at a bar, people are leaning over your shoulder to get a drink, people next to each other like this. It’s kind of fun because it’s social, but it’s not fun when this virus is in the air. So I would think that if there’s anything you want to clamp down on, for the time being, it’s bars.
Q: Some airlines and some states are telling people you have to get a coronavirus test before you get on the plane or visit another state. Does that make sense medically?
If you’re negative when you get on the plane — except in the rare circumstance that you’re in that little incubation window before you turn positive — that’s a good thing.
Q: If you had a national plan for testing, what would it be?
Surveillance testing. Literally flooding the system with tests. Getting a home test that you could do yourself, that’s highly sensitive and highly specific. And you know why that would be terrific? Because if you decided that you wanted to have a small gathering with your mother-in-law and father-in-law and a couple of children, and you had a test right there. It isn’t 100%. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. But the risk that you have — if everyone is tested before you get together to sit down for dinner — dramatically decreases. It might not ever be zero but, you know, we don’t live in a completely risk-free society.
Q: There are a number of vaccine candidates that are promising. But there’s also a lot of skepticism because we’ve seen the FDA come under both commercial and, increasingly, political pressure. When will we know it’s OK to take a vaccine? And which?
It’s pretty easy when you have vaccines that are 95% effective. Can’t get much better than that. I think what people need to appreciate — and that’s why I have said it like maybe 100 times in the last week or two — is the process by which a decision is made. The company looks at the data. I look at the data. Then the company puts the data to the FDA. The FDA will make the decision to do an emergency use authorization or a license application approval. And they have career scientists who are really independent. They’re not beholden to anybody. Then there’s another independent group, the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee. The FDA commissioner has vowed publicly that he will go according to the opinion of the career scientists and the advisory board.
Q: You feel the career scientists will have the final say?
Yes, yes.
Q:
And will the decisions that are being made in this transition period — like the vaccine distribution plan — in any way limit the options of a new administration?
No, I don’t think so. I think a new administration will have the choice of doing what they feel. But I can tell you what’s going to happen, regardless of the transition or not, is that we have people totally committed to doing it right that are going to be involved in this. So I have confidence in that.
Q: When do you think we’ll all be able to throw our masks away?
I think that we’re going to have some degree of public health measures together with the vaccine for a considerable period of time. But we’ll start approaching normal — if the overwhelming majority of people take the vaccine — as we get into the third or fourth quarter [of 2021].
Q: Thank you so much. And have a nice Thanksgiving.
Take care, and you too.
[Editor’s note: Dr. Fauci has said his family is forgoing the usual family Thanksgiving gathering this year because his adult children would have to fly home and that travel would expose him to risk.]
You can listen to the full interview on KHN’s “What the Health?” podcast.
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