Joe Biden, January 12, 2023
Crédit : Kevin Dietsch / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFP
The United States definitely wants to turn the page on Covid-19. For this, the White House indicated that the president had ratified a law passed by Congress “ending the national state of emergency linked to the Covid-19 pandemic” in place for three years. The state of health emergency, which is distinct, must expire on May 11.
With this decision, the considerable funds allocated since 2020 to the provision of Covid tests, free vaccines, and other emergency measures, will no longer be available.
The end of the national state of emergency should also go hand in hand with the expiry of a measure put in place in 2020 under the Trump administration, which allows the immediate expulsion of migrants who do not have a visa, even potential asylum seekers. The US executive said it wanted to lift this measure known as “Title 42” and replace it with a different legal mechanism to regulate the flow of migrants.
A senior White House official told AFP the use of the measure “should cease on May 11”.
Funds to stay ahead of the virus
If the US government publicly turns the page on the Covid-19 pandemic, it is already saying work on the next generation of vaccines and other measures to combat any future variants of the virus.
“No project NextGen will accelerate and streamline the rapid development of the next generation of vaccines and treatments through public-private partnerships,” a senior government official told AFP.
Funds amounting to at least $5 billion are available in order to “promote scientific advances“, and of “stay ahead of the virus in rapid evolution at the origin of the Covid-19″.
