Biden blames delta variant, unvaccinated people

[ad_1]

President Joe Biden blamed the coronavirus pandemic for a surprisingly weak employment report on Friday, calling on Americans who still have not been vaccinated even amid the spread of the highly infectious delta variant.

Non-farm payrolls in August rose only 235,000, the Labor Department reported, well below the 720,000 new hires predicted by economists. The report showed the smallest monthly job total since January.

“There’s no question that the delta variant is the reason today’s jobs report isn’t stronger,” Biden told the White House shortly after the data was released.

Biden, who spent much of his first leg in the White House focusing on the pandemic, said: “We need to make more progress in the fight against the delta variant.”

CNBC Politics

Learn more about CNBC’s political coverage:

Despite the government’s ongoing vaccination campaign, tens of millions of eligible Americans still have not received even a single dose of a Covid vaccine. Biden said this group is prolonging the pandemic and contributing to anxieties that are impacting the economy.

“This is a continuing pandemic of the unvaccinated,” the president said. “Too many people have not been vaccinated, and it creates a lot of unease in our economy and around our kitchen tables.”

Less than 64% of American adults, or about 175 million people, are fully immunized, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Pfizer-BioNTech’s two-shot Covid vaccine, the only one to receive full approval from the Food and Drug Administration, is only available to people 16 years of age and older. Children between the ages of 12 and 15 can still be vaccinated by Pfizer in an emergency.

Biden acknowledged the low numbers in the “I was hoping for a higher number” report, he said. But he nevertheless defended the economic progress that the United States experienced under his administration.

“What we are seeing is a sustainable and strong economic recovery. The Biden plan is working. We are getting results.”

The president pointed to the drop in the unemployment rate, down to 5.2% in the latest report from 6.3% in January.

He also referred to new measures the White House would take next week to combat the delta variant, suggesting that actions would focus on protecting schools, businesses, families and the economy from the virus.

The spread of the delta variant has led to another huge increase in Covid cases, hospitalizations and deaths across the country, with southern states particularly affected. Florida has a higher Covid hospitalization rate than anywhere else in the United States, and this week broke its record for the largest single-day increase in deaths, with 1,338 reported on Thursday.

Some experts predict that another peak is in store for the Northeast.

“Now if we see a wave of infection as dense and severe as the South, I don’t think it will because we have a lot more vaccinations; we have had a lot of previous infections, which we also know. is protective, ”Dr. Scott Gottlieb, who served as chief of the FDA for two years under President Donald Trump, told CNBC on Friday.

“But we’ll likely see an increase in cases here in the northeast,” he said. “I don’t think we’re done with this.

[ad_2]