Psaki Threatens Months Of ‘Sacrifice’ And Masks Before Pandemic Ends

White House press secretary Jen Psaki threatened Americans with many more months of COVID-19 mitigation strategies on Monday despite the United States’ relative vaccine rollout success.

“We need to remain vigilant, both from the federal government, the American people need to. You know, and it’s still going to be months and months of sacrifice, of work, of suffering, unfortunately, in order to get through the pandemic,” Psaki said during her Monday press briefing. 

As U.S. nears 500,000 COVID deaths, Psaki says at end of press briefing: “We need to remain vigilant…It’s still going to be months and months of sacrifice, of work, of suffering, unfortunately, in order to get through the pandemic” https://t.co/9T8aUPjUrs pic.twitter.com/nodAwgibat

— CBS News (@CBSNews) February 22, 2021

While Psaki admitted the United States leads the world in the number of vaccinations administered and is “second only to Israel in the share of population fully vaccinated,” she said the Biden administration will continue to peddle “new masking requirements to make sure people stay safe” and promote other COVID-19 restrictions and guidelines. 

Psaki also declared Americans should observe the U.S. death toll due to COVID-19 and noted the administration would be taking certain actions to honor the families of those who died due to the virus.

“I would say though that 500,000, a milestone of 500,000 deaths is certainly not something we’re celebrating,” she said. “And it’s hardly something, it’s something to commemorate and to take a moment to remember all of the families that have been impacted across the country.”

Anthony Fauci also recently said masks and other virus mitigation techniques paraded by the current administration might be necessary until at least 2022. “You know, I think it is possible that [continuing to wear masks is] the case. And, again, it really depends on what you mean by normality,” Fauci said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Psaki and Fauci’s comments bring to mind the projections made by health experts at the beginning of the pandemic last year, promising only “two weeks to flatten the curve,” which turned into months of stringent lockdowns and a worsening mental health crisis.