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Scott Gottlieb says vaccinated individuals cannot ‘throw warning to the wind’

U.S. may never reach 'true herd immunity,' says Dr. Scott Gottlieb

Dr. Scott Gottlieb on Friday urged fellow vaccinated Americans to be on guard about the Covid delta variant, telling CNBC its highly transmissible nature cannot be ignored even by people who have immunity protection.

“The original premise around the vaccines — that they reduce the risk of serious disease and hospitalization — is still intact,” the former Food and Drug Administration commissioner said on “Squawk Box.” “We still see in the data that the vast majority of people who are getting in trouble with Covid are people who are unvaccinated.”

However, Gottlieb, who serves on the board of Covid vaccine maker Pfizer, said the risk to vaccinated people is not zero.

“People who are vaccinated in a setting of this epidemic surge, especially if they’re in places where there’s a high prevalence of infection, need to take appropriate precautions,” he said. “You can’t just throw caution to the wind. You can still become a vehicle for spread in your community.”

The seven-day average of daily new coronavirus cases in the U.S. is 141,060, according to a CNBC analysis of Johns Hopkins University data. That’s up 14% from a week ago. Cases are increasing by more than 5% in 42 states plus Washington, D.C.

Gottlieb’s comments Friday came in response to a question about three vaccinated U.S. senators — Roger Wicker, Angus King, and John Hickenlooper — who announced a day earlier they had tested positive for Covid.

“I think there’s now a recognition that this delta is sufficiently contagious that it can pierce the protections offered by the vaccine, particularly if you were vaccinated a while ago and have declining immunity, as these senators probably did because they were vaccinated a long time ago,” said Gottlieb, who led the FDA from 2017 to 2019.

While some scientists disagree with U.S. health officials’ recent decision to authorize Covid booster shots beginning next month, Gottlieb said he believes the delta variant’s transmissibility supports the idea of delivering third doses to Americans. Noting his role on Pfizer’s board, Gottlieb said he’s studied the data that shows declining immunity protection over time.

“It happens to be the case that we vaccinated some of our most vulnerable older individuals in our society last December and January, particularly nursing homes,” Gottlieb said. “I think the prudent thing to do would be to get additional immunity in that population, especially considering the fact we’re dealing with a much more contagious variant.”

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the boards of Pfizer, genetic testing start-up Tempus, health-care tech company Aetion Inc. and biotech company Illumina. He also serves as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ and Royal Caribbean’s “Healthy Sail Panel.”

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Dr. Gottlieb says places of work with vaccine mandates do not want extra precautions

Dr. Scott Gottlieb expects little impact on U.S. Covid cases

Companies that require office workers to get Covid vaccinations are unlikely to need to take additional precautions against the virus even as the Delta variant spikes, Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Thursday.

“I think companies probably don’t need to take any additional measures right now,” such as: B. regulated virus tests, Gottlieb told co-host Andrew Ross Sorkin in “Squawk Box”.

“The belief is that people who are vaccinated and develop the infection can be contagious early in the course of the infection, but clear the infection faster,” added Gottlieb, who was Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from 2017 to 2019 Board member at several companies, including vaccine maker Pfizer.

Gottlieb pointed to real evidence in Israel showing that “people who get vaccinated and become infected spread within the household but not outside the household.”

Vaccinated people still need to be vigilant about the virus and get tested if they have a viral illness, he said.

“You can certainly see that infection rates are increasing among the vaccinated population. People who were vaccinated some time ago are more prone to Covid. Eventually, some of these infections will give poor results, ”he said.

The number of companies requiring their employees to vaccinate has increased in recent days, with McDonald’s being the latest corporate giant to put such a policy in place on Wednesday. The vaccination edict of the fast food chain applies to the company’s workforce.

Gottlieb said he expected more companies to follow suit, especially those that want employees to return to the office after more than a year of remote work in the fall. He cited the government’s vaccination requirement for U.S. military personnel and federal employees – as well as the potential full FDA approval of Covid vaccines – as “an added boost to businesses” that will “give them confidence that they have the legal basis to do so” stand in relation to compulsory vaccination. “

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion, and biotechnology company Illumina. He is also co-chair of the Healthy Sail Panel of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings and Royal Caribbean.

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb expects Covid to be ‘endemic’ in U.S. after delta surge

Dr. Scott Gottlieb expects Covid to be 'endemic' in U.S. after delta surge

Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Friday that he expected the coronavirus to become an endemic virus in the US and other western countries after the recent surge in Delta variant infections settled.

“We are going from a pandemic to a more endemic virus, at least here in the United States and probably in other western markets,” said Gottlieb on “Squawk Box”. An endemic virus is one that remains relatively infrequent in the American population, such as seasonal flu.

Gottlieb – Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from 2017 to 2019 during the Trump administration and now a board member at several companies, including vaccine maker Pfizer – has previously said that “true herd immunity” for Covid in new infections may indeed be impossible for years to come .

“It’s not a binary point in time, but I think after we get through this delta wave this becomes more of an endemic disease where you see some kind of persistent infection through winter … but not at the level” we certainly do experience right now, and it doesn’t necessarily depend on the booster shots, “added Gottlieb on Friday.

Gottlieb said he anticipates the spread of the highly transmissible Delta variant will remain remarkable in the coming weeks.

“You will probably see the course of the delta wave between the end of September and October,” said Gottlieb. “Hopefully we’ll be on the other side, or come the other side, sometime in November, and we won’t see a big bout of infection on the other side of this delta wave after that.”

The tri-state region of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut will see a spike in delta cases as rates slow in the south, Gottlieb said.

“This is a big country and the delta wave will be regionalized to sweep across the whole country,” he said. “Hopefully by September you will see the other side of that curve very clearly in the south, but falls will increase in the northeast, in the Great Lakes region, maybe in the Pacific Northwest. … It will likely coincide with a restart at school, some companies are coming back if you look at last summer too. “

Gottlieb’s comments on Friday morning came before the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gave final approval to begin distributing Covid vaccine booster vaccines to recipients of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines who have weakened immune systems. The CDC’s approval followed a unanimous vote on Friday to recommend booster vaccinations for its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. It now enables the shots to reach vulnerable people such as organ transplant recipients, cancer and HIV patients.

The day before, the FDA approved booster injections for people with compromised immune systems. They make up about 2.7% of the US adult population, but account for about 44% of hospitalized breakthrough Covid cases among fully vaccinated people, according to recent data from the CDC.

Gottlieb said the ability to give these Americans booster vaccinations, which help strengthen their immunity levels, will push the US further into the “endemic phase”.

“I think this is both a political call and a public health call for US officials to continue trying to promote initial vaccinations before they move on to booster vaccinations,” Gottlieb said of the FDA’s announcement on Thursday.

Some of the people Gottlieb believes should get Covid booster vaccinations soon include nursing home residents, who tend to be older and have underlying medical conditions that make them more prone to Covid. That’s especially worrying as the Delta variant invades the northern states and continues to postpone its first round of vaccination in the rearview mirror, he said.

“I would be concerned about nursing homes entering these environments now, given that there is a patient population that is likely to have declining immunity and is more vulnerable than it was five months ago.”

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion, and biotechnology company Illumina. He is also co-chair of the Healthy Sail Panel of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings and Royal Caribbean.

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Dr. Gottlieb says delta variant surge will be the ‘last wave’ in U.S.

Dr. Gottlieb says delta variant surge may be the ‘final wave’ in U.S.

Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Monday that the current spike in Covid infections caused by the more contagious Delta variant could be the “last wave” of the virus in the United States.

“I don’t think Covid will be epidemic all through the fall and winter. I think this is the final wave, the final act, provided we don’t have a variant that pierces the immunity of a previous infection.” or vaccination, “the former Food and Drug Administration commissioner told the Squawk Box.” This will likely be the wave of infections that will end up affecting people who refuse to be vaccinated. “

Gottlieb said Americans still have a few months to take pandemic-related precautions, especially in the northern US states, as cases peak in the south until the wave of infections subsides again.

“I think this is going to be a difficult time,” he said. However, Gottlieb said the contagious nature of the Delta variant and the increased vaccination rates could change the course of future infections.

“We’re going to get some population-wide exposure to this virus, either through vaccination or through previous infection, which at this rate will stop circulating at that rate,” said Gottlieb, who ran the FDA from 2017-2019 under the Donald Trump administration.

According to a CNBC analysis of Johns Hopkins University data, the seven-day average of new daily coronavirus cases in the US is 108,624. That is 36% more than a week ago. The highly communicable Delta variant, first identified in India, accounts for 83% of all sequenced Covid cases in the country, according to estimates by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Given the surge in infections to coincide with plans to reopen schools in the fall, Gottlieb warned that schools may have to start the year with more stringent containment measures such as masking, testing, physical distancing and collecting through capsules.

“The goal must be to keep schools open and open, and we cannot expect us to change all behaviors about what we do about mitigation in schools and achieve the same result, in particular with this new “Delta variant, which is more contagious and will inevitably be difficult to control in schools,” said Gottlieb, who sits on the board of directors of the Covid vaccine manufacturer Pfizer.

Large numbers of vaccinated people can still congregate at a venue if there is an “appearance of a bubble,” he said. Vaccinated people who become infected are likely to get the virus from unvaccinated people and then spread it to close contacts after being contagious for a brief window of time, the former FDA chief said.

Gottlieb said wearing a higher quality mask like the KN95 mask is more important now as the virus is known to spread through aerosols rather than droplets. A good quality cloth mask only offers 20% protection from transmission, and most people don’t wear it well, he said.

“We’re bringing a kind of alpha mindset into a delta world, and it’s not going to work,” said Gottlieb, referring to the alpha coronavirus variant that was first discovered in the UK last year. “We will see that this delta variant is more difficult to control,” he said.

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion, and biotechnology company Illumina. He is also co-chair of the Healthy Sail Panel of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings and Royal Caribbean.

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb estimates as much as 1 million Individuals contaminated with Covid every day as delta spreads

Dr. Scott Gottlieb estimates up to 1 million Americans infected with Covid daily as delta spreads

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Friday he believes the coronavirus is significantly more widespread in the U.S. than official case counts reflect as the highly contagious delta variant sweeps the nation.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if, on the whole, we’re infecting up to a million people a day right now, and we’re just picking up maybe a 10th of that or less than a 10th of that,” the former Food and Drug Administration commissioner said in an interview on “Squawk Box.” Gottlieb now serves on the board of Covid vaccine maker Pfizer.

The current seven-day average of new daily coronavirus cases in the U.S. is roughly 67,000, according to a CNBC analysis of Johns Hopkins University data. That’s up 53% compared with a week ago, as the country grapples with a surge in new infections driven largely by delta, first discovered in India and now the dominant variant in the U.S.

The highest seven-day day average of new Covid cases recorded in the U.S. was roughly 251,000 on Jan. 8, according to CNBC’s analysis. Case counts had dropped off dramatically in the spring as the country’s vaccination campaign picked up speed.

But in recent weeks, as U.S. cases again started to accelerate, Gottlieb has said a large number of coronavirus infections were likely going unreported because the testing landscape is different now than at earlier stages in the pandemic.

For example, he previously told CNBC people can now complete at-home tests and those results are unlikely to make their way to health authorities and then show up in official case counts.

Additionally, Gottlieb has said vaccinated Americans who may become infected are likely to have a mild case or remain entirely asymptomatic, making them less likely to seek out a Covid test than they would’ve been before they were inoculated against the disease.

— CNBC’s Nate Rattner contributed to this report.

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the boards of Pfizer, genetic testing start-up Tempus, health-care tech company Aetion Inc. and biotech company Illumina. He also serves as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ and Royal Caribbean’s “Healthy Sail Panel.”

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The epidemic will sweep throughout the U.S. at completely different occasions, Dr. Scott Gottlieb says

The epidemic will sweep across the U.S. at different times, Dr. Scott Gottlieb says

Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC that he expects surging U.S. coronavirus cases, linked to the highly transmissible delta variant, to start decreasing in just a few weeks. 

“Probably, in two or three weeks, I think that we were probably about three weeks behind the U.K.,” said the former FDA chief in the Trump administration.  

“The U.K. clearly is on a downslope…I would expect some of the southern states that really were the epicenter of this epidemic to start rolling over in the next two or three weeks.”

While the epidemic is still expanding across southern states, the rate of expansion is showing signs slowing. Gottlieb told “The News with Shepard Smith” that the slowdown is a sign that those southern states may be reaching their peak. 

Gottlieb did warn, however, that northern states may start to see more delta spread, as rates decrease in the south. 

“Here, in this country, it’s going to be much more regionalized now, I don’t expect the density of the spread of delta in states like New York or Michigan to be what it was in the south,” Gottlieb said. “We have more vaccine coverage, up there, we’ve had more prior infection, but you will see an uptick in cases, even in states where there is a lot of vaccine coverage, probably just not as severe.” 

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the boards of Pfizer, genetic testing start-up Tempus, health-care tech company Aetion Inc. and biotech company Illumina. He also serves as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ and Royal Caribbean’s “Healthy Sail Panel.”

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb says the Covid delta spike could peak in late August

Vaccine ramp up probably not enough to manage UK virus variant

Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Thursday the current spike in Covid infections due to the highly contagious delta variant may be over sooner than many experts believe.

However, the former FDA chief urged Americans to take precautions in the meantime as delta, first found in India, takes hold as the dominant variant in the U.S.

“I think the bottom line is we’re going to see continued growth, at least in the next three to four weeks. There’s going to be a peak sometime probably around late August, early September,” Gottlieb said on “Squawk Box.” “I happen to believe that we’re further into this delta wave than we’re measuring so this may be over sooner than we think. But we don’t really know because we’re not doing a lot of testing now either.”

There may be another small bump in infection rates as schools reopen in the fall and become “vectors of transmission” as they did with the B.1.1.7 variant, first discovered in Britain, and now called alpha, said Gottlieb, who led the Food and Drug Administration from 2017 to 2019 during Donald Trump’s presidency.

Gottlieb also warned that just wearing masks, particularly cloth masks, may not enough to prevent Covid infections from the delta variant in classrooms. He advised schools to create pods, space out children in the classroom, avoid group meals and suspend certain large activities, as well as improve air filtration and quality levels. 

“There might be other things you do that actually achieve more risk reduction than the masks in the setting of a much more contagious variant where we know there’s going to be spread even with masks,” Gottlieb said. “If we’re going to tell people to wear masks, I do think we need to start educating people better about quality of masks and the differences in terms of the reduction and risk you’re achieving with different kinds of masks.”

For businesses wanting to bring people back into offices, Gottlieb said that October may be a more “prudent” time than September.

Gottlieb, who serves on the board of Covid vaccine maker Pfizer, said the critical question right now is how likely vaccinated people are to transmit the virus if they become infected. He said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention should be collecting that data because it’s likely the current delta variant may be the newer, more permanent form of coronavirus going forward.

“When you’re dealing with a new variant where the virus levels that you achieve early in the course of your infection are thousandfold the original strain, it’s possible that you’re shedding more virus and you could be more contagious,” he said.

Local officials across the country are advising and reimposing indoor mask mandates as the highly transmissible delta variant causes Covid cases and deaths to increase again in the U.S., particularly in largely unvaccinated communities.

Nearly 162 million people in the U.S. are fully vaccinated — almost 49% of the nation’s population — even as the rate of daily administered shots has seen a sharp dip in recent months, according to a CDC tracker.

The CDC eased its Covid guidelines on masks for fully vaccinated people on May 13.

Since delta has taken a stronger hold, however, health experts are cautioning people to again use masks and follow public health measures. White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci told CNBC on Wednesday that even fully vaccinated people may want to consider wearing masks indoors as a protective measure against the delta variant.

Last week, Gottlieb told CNBC that he believes the U.S. is “vastly underestimating” the number of Covid delta infections, particularly among vaccinated people with mild symptoms, making it harder to understand if the variant is causing higher-than-expected hospitalization and death rates. 

“The endgame here was always going to be a final wave of infection,” Gottlieb told CNBC on Thursday. “We had anticipated that this summer would be relatively quiet and we’d have a surge of infections in the fall with B.1.1.7, and that would be sort of the final wave of the pandemic phase of this virus and we would enter a more endemic phase where this virus just becomes a fact of life and it circulates at a certain level.”

But unlike the early last year, he added, “We have therapeutics and vaccines to deal with it, we’re better at treating it and it becomes sort of like a second flu.”

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the boards of Pfizer, genetic testing start-up Tempus, health-care tech company Aetion and biotech company Illumina. He also serves as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ and Royal Caribbean’s “Healthy Sail Panel.”

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Some portion of the U.S. inhabitants will get booster photographs, Dr. Scott Gottlieb says

Some portion of the U.S. population will get booster shots, Dr. Scott Gottlieb says

Former Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Scott Gottlieb said Thursday that Covid booster vaccinations could become a reality for certain segments of the population. Gottlieb made the prediction, following the news, that a panel of expert advisors from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is planning to consider booster vaccinations for immunocompromised patients.

“I think the bottom line is that we will strengthen part of the population,” Gottlieb told CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith”. “I think it’s something we need to do to consider boosters, especially among the older, more vulnerable populations.”

Gottlieb noted that Israel already offers booster shots to adults with severe pre-existing conditions and that France and the UK are planning to give booster shots. The former FDA chief in the Trump administration also cited data from Israel showing that the shelf life of Covid vaccines does not last as long as researchers would have expected from the start.

“I think we will achieve our goal in terms of boosters, especially for the older population, who were vaccinated in December and January,” said Gottlieb. “You might get a very permanent reaction after the third dose.”

Host Shepard Smith also asked Gottlieb about the reintroduction of mask mandates across the country as a result of the highly transferable Delta variant. Los Angeles County issued a new mask mandate on Thursday that requires residents to wear masks indoors regardless of their vaccination status.

Gottlieb told Smith that he believed Los Angeles was the exception and advised individuals to take masking measures into their own hands.

“I think individuals in these hot spots across the country who are at risk need to take action and take precautions if they think they are at risk, as it is widespread in states that have already done so takes place affirmed that they will not return to mandates, “said Gottlieb.

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion Inc., and biotechnology company Illumina.

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb says U.S. is ‘vastly underestimating’ stage of Covid delta unfold

Dr. Scott Gottlieb says U.S. is ‘vastly underestimating’ level of Covid delta spread

Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Friday that he believes the US is significantly under counting Covid Delta infections, making it difficult to know if the highly communicable strain is causing unexpectedly high hospital admissions and death rates.

“We just don’t know what the denominator is,” said Gottlieb in an interview with “Squawk Box”. “I think we are underestimating the extent of the Delta Spread right now because I think that people who are vaccinated may develop mild symptoms or develop a breakthrough case, by and large, not going out and getting tested. has been vaccinated and you are just catching a mild cold, don’t think you have Covid. “

Coronavirus cases in the United States have increased due to the Delta variant, with the seven-day average of new infections every day a CNBC analysis of data from Johns Hopkins University at 26,448. That’s 67% more than a week ago. The weekly average of new daily deaths has increased to 273 from a week ago, according to CNBC analysis.

“There is no clear evidence that this is more pathogenic, that it causes more serious infections. It is clearly more virulent, it is clearly more contagious” than previous strains of the virus, said Gottlieb, who sits on the board of directors at Covid vaccine manufacturer Pfizer.

If younger Americans get the Delta variant at a higher level compared to earlier points in the pandemic, it is because “younger people remain unvaccinated,” claimed Gottlieb. “When vaccinated people get infected and there are breakthrough infections, they don’t get as sick. They are protected from serious illnesses.”

Delta is now the most common strain of coronavirus in the United States, accounting for more than 57% of cases in the two weeks June 20 through July 3. This is the latest available window on the CDC website.

U.S. health officials have been sounding the alarm for weeks about the potential of the variant to reduce hard-earned advances in reducing infection rates that plummeted in the spring as the American vaccination campaign took off. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, by Friday 48.3% of the country’s population had been fully vaccinated and nearly 56% had received at least one dose.

The Covid vaccination rate is higher in the most vulnerable group of Americans: the elderly. According to the CDC, more than 79% of people aged 65 and over are fully vaccinated and nearly 89% have received at least one dose.

The vast majority of US states with currently high infection rates – defined as at least 100 new cases in the last seven days per 100,000 residents – have vaccinated fewer than 40% of their residents, according to a CNBC analysis completed earlier this week.

Los Angeles County officials responded Thursday to a surge in cases by reintroducing an indoor mask mandate for those who were fully vaccinated. LA County, the most populous county in the country, had lifted its previous mask requirement about a month ago, in conjunction with the lifting of most of its remaining pandemic restrictions by the state of California.

Gottlieb said he doesn’t expect many other state or local governments to follow LA County and put in place abated mitigation measures “because there won’t be much support for mandates at this point.”

“People who are worried about Covid have been vaccinated for the most part. I understand that not everyone could be vaccinated, but most of the people who are worried about this infection have been vaccinated,” said Gottlieb, who was the FDA in 2017 in the Trump administration until 2019.

“People who remain unvaccinated are not worried about the infection or want to wear masks. The bottom line is that this will only spread to the population,” he added.

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion, and biotechnology company Illumina. He is also co-chair of the Healthy Sail Panel of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings and Royal Caribbean.

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U.S. unlikely to have one other ‘raging epidemic,’ Gottlieb says

U.S. unlikely to have another ‘raging epidemic,’ Gottlieb says

Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Wednesday that he believes there is enough Covid immunity protection throughout the U.S. population that even if the highly transmissible Delta variant is in circulation, the country is unlikely to experience anywhere near as dire like previous points of the pandemic.

“I don’t think there’s going to be a raging epidemic across the country like we saw last winter. I think there will be niches of spread and the overall prevalence will increase, “said the former Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration said on” Squawk Box. ”

“But I think that in parts of the country where vaccination rates are high, and that certainly applies to the northeast, in my opinion we are largely protected – at least from the current variants that are in circulation,” added board member Gottlieb of Covid Vaccine manufacturer Pfizer.

On the other hand, Gottlieb said parts of the country are more prone to outbreaks with the Covid Delta variant. These are places where the number of people who have previously been infected or vaccinated is low. He highlighted the situation in Missouri, where health officials have raised concerns about spikes in cases and hospital admissions, particularly in areas with lagging vaccination rates.

“If you are someone who has even been vaccinated in these parts of the country and there is a heavy epidemic of this new variant of the Delta, you are also at risk because we know the vaccines are not 100% and we know it. ” In vulnerable populations – people with compromised immune systems, people who are much older – the vaccines may not work as well over time. “

First found in India, the Delta variant has been identified in more than 90 countries, including the United States, where its prevalence doubles roughly every two weeks. In some countries, such as Israel, concerns about the Delta variant have led governments to tighten public health restrictions.

The UK postponed the most recent phase of its economic reopening earlier this month, citing the pace of new Delta variant infections and an increase in hospital admissions. Most of the cases involved unvaccinated people.

Los Angeles County officials released guidelines for inner masks this week, including those for fully vaccinated individuals, amid concerns about the Delta variant. It comes roughly two weeks after the county joined the state of California to lift mask requirements for fully vaccinated individuals indoors in most environments.

The World Health Organization on Friday also urged fully vaccinated people to continue wearing face masks, and officials said it was necessary to “play it safe” as many parts of the world are still unvaccinated.

“The goal should be to try to reduce transmission as much as possible here in the United States. I think we shouldn’t be rash,” said Gottlieb, who headed the FDA in the Trump administration from 2017 to 2019 . “But we will see that the overall impact of the virus will be greatly reduced because so many people have been vaccinated.”

In the United States, around 154.2 million people, or 46.4% of the population, are fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Almost 180 million people, or 54.2% of the country’s population, have received at least one dose.

According to a CNBC analysis of Johns Hopkins University data, there are an average of around 12,400 new coronavirus cases per day in the United States, based on an average of seven days. That is 10% more than a week ago. The daily average of Covid deaths fell 7% to 278 per day over the same period.

Despite the increase in cases, Gottlieb said he believed US public health officials should be cautious about reintroducing pandemic restrictions right now. Daily new infections remain dramatically lower than their daily high in the US of 300,462 on Jan. 2, according to Johns Hopkins data.

“I think the right response is first and foremost to have more people vaccinated,” said Gottlieb. “We have just got to a point where our mitigation should be really reactive, not proactive,” he added. “We shouldn’t shut things up or put off mask requirements in anticipation of spread. I think we should do this when we see signs of spread, signs of outbreaks. “

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion Inc., and biotechnology company Illumina. He is also co-chair of the Healthy Sail Panel of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings and Royal Caribbean.