Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Dr. Rochelle Walensky Friday on Fox News Channel’s “Special Report” that the Delta variant surge can not be attributed to the high rate of coronavirus cases at the U.S.-Mexico border because the infection rate is “really quite high” in “the southern part of this country.”

Baier said, “One woman wrote in, My in-laws live in Austria, they cannot come here to see their six-month-old baby because of the EU travel band even as migrants come across the southern border from other countries with more COVID and worse vaccine performance and they are allowed in. Is that a problem, Dr. Walensky?”

Walensky said, “We’re working, um, at the CDC to provide technical assistance for all areas of travel as well as to provide technical assistance at the southern border. So as people come in, we are keeping migrants, as well as those communities, as safe as possible with the technical assistance and infection prevention guidelines from the CDC.”

Baier said, “But do you know the surge, how the surge of illegal immigrants with COVID is affecting the overall rate, you know, it sounds like the percentages down there on the border are astronomical?”

Walensky said, “Yeah, you know, I would say that the percentages in the southern part of this country are really quite high. I don’t necessarily think we can attribute all of that to what’s going on at the southern border. I think what we really need to do is spend our time getting our communities vaccinated to getting our individuals vaccinated to prevent disease from transmitting in our communities.”

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