U.S. faces pandemic crossroads with Covid deaths still too high and new omicron variants emerging, Fauci says

White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci on Thursday said the U.S. is at a crossroads in the Covid-19 pandemic as new omicron subvariants are gaining ground across the country. Fauci, in a radio interview Thursday, said the pandemic has clearly eased since last winter, but deaths, which average more than 2,600 per week, remain far too high. At the same time, the new omicron variants are knocking out key tools used to protect the most vulnerable. “We’re really at a point that may be a crossroads here. As we’re entering into the cooler months, we are starting to see the emergence of sublineage variants of omicron,” Fauci said on the “Conversations on Health Care” radio show.