Fauci on Getting Back to Normal: ‘Depends on What You Mean by Normal’; Says ‘Somewhere Between the Fall and Winter’

Thursday on MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” White House chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci weighed in on the United States “getting back to normal” following a battle with the coronavirus pandemic.

Fauci acknowledged there are “so many things in play” before predicting a return to normalcy. He added it “also depends on what you mean by normal,”

“It … depends on what you mean by ‘normal,'” Fauci told host Andrea Mitchell. “What does some form of normality mean? Well, obviously, we have very stringent public health measures in tune now. If you’re going to ask — what about getting back to a situation where you can have theaters that might be able to have below capacity, that restaurants, indoor dining can be happening, but with moderately diminished capacity? That’s going to be somewhere between the fall and the end of the year. If you say, ‘No, no, no, wait a minute. I really want to know when it’s going to get to as close to normal ha you almost don’t know the difference between what it was before, maybe you’re going to still have to wear masks.’ That likely will be, as the president said, by the end of the year, by Christmas.”

He continued, “But … these are all estimates. And so many things can happen to modify that. And that’s the reason why when you ask people like myself and others, we say ‘Likely,’ because if it were a mathematical formula, I could give you a real number, but there are so many things that can happen, including one of the ones that you mentioned, namely the variants can come in and we may be able to see a situation, unfortunately, where you have an increase or a little blip which would interfere with that timeline.”

Fauci also predicted normalcy would return “somewhere between the fall and the winter.”

“I still hold that somewhere between the fall and the winter we’re going to end up seeing it,” he advised.

Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent