Fauci: Time to Start ‘Inching’ to Normality, ‘Risky’ to Pull Mask Mandates

White House chief medical adviser on COVID-19 Dr. Anthony Fauci listens as U.S. President Joe Biden (out of frame) speaks about the 50 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine shot administered in the United States, in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington on Feb. 25, 2021. Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

White House COVID-19 adviser Anthony Fauci said this week that it’s time for the United States to start heading back to normalcy after two years of lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and other COVID-19-related rules.

“The fact that the world and the United States and particularly certain parts of the United States are just up to here with COVID ... they just really need to somehow get their life back,” Fauci told the Reuters news agency on Wednesday. “You don’t want to be reckless and throw everything aside, but you’ve got to start inching towards that.”