“It’s time for Americans to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again,” Biden says as we are now two years into the pandemic

The last two have been pretty tough for everyone. As we are now officially two years into the pandemic, we can sum up that nothing similar in recent history has caused what everyone of us went through since March 2020. And whether we like it or not, it looks like we are still far from the end of the pandemic.

People were getting infected with Covid-19 and some were dying, businesses were closed, face masks, curfews, students were switching to virtual learning. These are some of the things we went to forget as soon as possible as we aim to return back to what we say is ‘normal’.

US President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced new efforts to allow people getting back to normal as his announcement marked two years into the pandemic. According to Biden, “it’s time for Americans to get back to work” and return to normal activities safely after two years of pandemic struggles.

One of the most important details of Biden’s announcement is that the White House administration is launching “test-to-treat” initiative meaning that everyone who will test positive on Covid-19 will be eligible to receive Covid-pills directly from the pharmacies completely free of charge.

In addition, Biden used this occasion to note the improvement the country has made since last year saying that reducing the number of cases and fatalities is due to the vaccines and free testing kits which helped in battling the pandemic and opening our way to the good old normal.

“Tonight, I can say we are moving forward safely, back to more normal routines,” Biden said. “It’s time for Americans to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again.”

As part of the new efforts in fighting the pandemic, Biden announced that there will be yet another round of free tests for people in the pharmacies, similar to the one that happened a month ago.

When it comes to Covid-19 treatment, Pfizer’s antiviral pill has shown to reduce the effects of the virus and keep people safe from developing serious condition and hospitalization. According to the data provided by the company, the pill has 90% efficacy in treating Covid-ill patients.

Biden said that there will be more than 1 million pills distributed in pharmacies across the country in March, and that number is expected to be doubled in April. As we said earlier, the pills will be given free of charge for Covid-ill patients, a project that will be completely funded by the government.

Biden said that starting next week, the administration would make available four more free tests to U.S. households through COVIDTests.gov, which has sent more than 270 million free tests to nearly 70 million households since it launched in mid-January.

The situation with the Covid-19 was pretty stable and under control since Biden took over the White House officer in January 2021. That changed in the summer months last year with the Delta variant, but the fall months were quite in terms of corona. But everything again changed since early December when the first Omicron cases were discovered in several states.

Omicron, the most transmissible variant of the virus so far, easily evades both natural and vaccine immunities and quickly became the most dominant variant nationwide in a matter of weeks. Although vaccine and natural immunity prevent severe condition, hospitalizations and deaths in most the cases, America set new daily records both in terms of daily new cases and hospitalizations in the Omicron peak.

In the last couple of weeks, the Covid numbers are constantly declining which seems to be an encouraging factor as we head into the springs months when people start to spend more time outdoors.

Earlier Tuesday, Biden extended the federal government’s 100% reimbursement of COVID-19 emergency response costs to states, tribes and territories through July 1, the White House announced Tuesday.

White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients informed governors on a conference call that Biden is approving the extension of Federal Emergency Management Agency support to help continue FEMA-backed efforts like vaccination clinics, mass testing sites and surging hospital resources to deal with local case spikes.

“FEMA’s priority throughout the response to COVID-19 has been to coordinate and provide the necessary resources and personnel states, tribes and territories need to adequately respond to the pandemic,” FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell said. “Today’s extension of the 100% cost-share through July 1, 2022, builds on our efforts to assist impacted communities across state and federal levels.”

The extension through the first half of the year is a sign that the White House continues to see a need for federal resources in combating COVID-19 even as Biden tries to guide the country to live with the coronavirus while case counts recede.

Biden, a Democrat, first signed an order directing FEMA to cover 100% of state emergency costs related to the coronavirus on his second day in office through September 2021. He subsequently extended it to the end of 2021 and again through April 1.