Heather Hamilton of the Washington Examiner reports an interesting assessment from tech guru Bill Gates.
Billionaire Bill Gates said the omicron variant moved faster than COVID-19 vaccines, creating a high level of natural immunity.
While speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Gates, who has helped to fund the development and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, was asked for his opinion on where the pandemic stands.
“Sadly, the virus itself, particularly, the variant called omicron, is a type of vaccine, that is, it creates both B-cell and T-cell immunity, and it’s done a better job getting out to the world population than we have with vaccines,” the Microsoft co-founder said. “That means the chance of severe disease, which is mainly associated with being elderly and having obesity or diabetes, those risks are now dramatically reduced because of that infection, exposure.”
Gates, who is not a medical doctor, noted that vaccination efforts moved too slowly for his liking.
“It’s sad we didn’t do a great job on therapeutics, only two years in, and we have a good therapeutic,” Gates said. “Vaccines have took us two years to be in oversupply. Today, there are more vaccines than there is demand for vaccines.”
Gates called for a quicker response “more like six months.”
On Friday, President Joe Biden extended the national state of emergency in response to COVID-19.
The National Emergencies Act requires that the president notify Congress within 90 days prior to the state of emergency expiring or the state of emergency is automatically terminated.
“More than 900,000 people in this Nation have perished from the disease, and it is essential to continue to combat and respond to COVID-19 with the full capacity and capability of the Federal Government,” Biden stated in his notice.
The national state of emergency was set to expire on March 1.
