WHEN: Monday, September 27, 2021
WHERE: CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith”
Following is the unofficial transcript of a CNBC interview with Shepard Smith and CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky on “The News with Shepard Smith” (M-F, 7PM-8PM ET) today, Monday, September 27th. Following is a link to video on CNBC.com:
All references must be sourced to CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith”.
SHEPARD SMITH: Dr. Rochelle Walensky now, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Doctor, thanks so much for being here. Who if you could help us, who should get a booster shot? It’s really not clear to everybody. For instance, in West Virginia, the governor says anyone older than 18 should get one. Other states are restricting them to those who are over, for instance, age 75. After months of criticism, why is it that the government is still unable to deliver one clear, unified message on what Americans should do?
DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY: Good evening, Shepard. Thanks so much for having me. So first, I want to be clear and we’re going to talk about boosters in just a second but one of our key priorities right now is to make sure that the 70 million people who haven’t yet been vaccinated, get vaccinated because those are the people who are at high risk of being hospitalized and dying from COVID-19 right now. But as we move and talk about boosters, this was an important first step. Our first step was looking at people who received the Pfizer vaccine as their primary series and they are now more than six months after their second shot. So, if that is you, you’re eligible for a booster if you’re over the age of 65, if you have a, an underlying condition that puts you at high risk of severe disease and if you’re, at work or live in a place that puts you at high risk of exposure so let’s unpack that a little bit. If you’re at high risk of severe disease, those are people who have underlying conditions like asthma, diabetes, underlying heart disease, obesity, and then people who are at high risk by virtue of where they work. These are people like our frontline healthcare workers, our teachers, our transportation workers, our grocery workers, our frontline workers. So those are the groups who are eligible for a boost right now.
SMITH: Doctor, you told the Atlantic today that you plan to get a booster yourself, but you want to make sure those who are at higher risk get them first. And at the same time, the administration has promised there’re plenty of shots for boosters or whatever else. So, so why are you concerned about supply?
WALENSKY: I’m not at all concerned about supply. I do know that there have been some queues in the pharmacies as people have been wanting to get their boost right away. So, I merely mean, indicated that I was, I didn’t want to sort of be in a rush above those who are over the age of 65 who might be more at risk than I am. And I’ll wait a week or two and I will absolutely get mine.
SMITH: You know, a lot of us still wear masks all the time. We’re around our friends because our friends have little kids who can’t get vaccinated. And for months we’ve been hearing an approved vaccine for children age five to 11 is coming, still hasn’t happened. Should that process have been, I mean, fast tracked or sped up in some way?
WALENSKY: So, you know, there is this important balance and this is such a key question and we’re addressing it with urgency. On the one hand, we want to have a vaccine for these children as soon as possible. On the other hand, we absolutely want to do the due diligence of the clinical trials, of the scientific review to make sure when those vaccines are delivered to our children, that they are safe and effective. We heard just over the weekend that we anticipate to see the data to the FDA I hope within days. The FDA will absolutely be addressing those data with urgency and as soon as they give their authorization. if that’s what they choose to do and we expect that they will. then the CDC will absolutely be giving its recommendations soon thereafter that.
SMITH: I know it’s all so complicated but no matter what happens there, it still leaves a lot of really little kids and it still leaves a lot of elderly people and underlying condition people who, we’re all if we’re not crazy concerned about and that means there’re masks here and there and everywhere. Are masks with us for a long, long time, years, forever?
WALENSKY: Well, you know, I think the really important thing to emphasize here is the best way you can protect people with underlying conditions, immunosuppression and people who are unable to get vaccinated, is to get vaccines yourself, to surround them by people who are vaccinated which puts them at much lower risk of disease. What we do know right now from the Delta variant is for people who have had two doses of the vaccine, they still need to wear their masks and the rare case that they might be a breakthrough infection. We absolutely are having studies that are starting now so that we can assess if after your booster shot, if you were to get a breakthrough infection whether you can still transmit, our hope is no and we’ll absolutely be doing those studies. Once we have those studies, I do hope that with disease transmission coming down, community transmission coming down, we will one day be able to get rid of those masks.
SMITH: We all hope. Dr. Walensky, thank you.
