it much milder on the front end than have to cope with treatment on the back end. making the case that, again, prevention is better than cure and there is not that straight line from, you know, a to z here. dr. shaffner, your colleague dr. fauci is laying out what we know about omicron today. let s talk transparent. he is confirming that the variant is, as you say, highly transmissable, making up at least 73% of cases in the country, and could even already account for 90% of cases in some states. i mean, omicron wasn t here even a month ago and now it s the dominant variant. how concerning is this for people? well, it s absolutely stunning that we have a virus mutation, a variant, that could exceed even delta in its transmisibility, in its being contagious. clearly, clearly omicron has done that. and it s taking over. it s outrunning delta.