White House COVID task force calls for ‘flexibility’ in order to combat the changing virus

The nation’s top infectious disease expert says in order to keep up with ever evolving COVID-19, we need to be “flexible” to move with the changing virus.

“Innovative approaches are clearly needed to induce broad and durable protection against coronaviruses known and unknown,” said National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci.

Fauci’s comments came on Tuesday while taking part in the White House COVID Summit, which focused on the future of vaccines.

“There are two pillars of the next generation that we’re all interested [in], concerned with and pushing for. One is a pan-coronavirus vaccine that has both breadth and durability. That’s important. And next, mucosal vaccine,” Fauci said.

A mucosal vaccine is one that is inhaled instead of injected, using the same technology as a shot. Those types of vaccines can help protect against viruses that enter through the nose, as the coronavirus does.

“One of the successes of the COVID trials was we leveraged the clinical trial network that we built over decades for HIV. We need to do that with these vaccines,” Fauci said.