not just the vaccines and the boosters, but testing, using masks judiciously, and using better ventilation and gathering better ventilated spaces. what i would say to folks out there, i know it s tough right now. i know there s a prospect of another wave with omicron coming, but we now know more about how to stay safe than we ve ever known. if you re vaccinated and boosted, your risk of having a bad outcome with covid-19 is much, much lower and we will get to the end of this pandemic. we ve gone through twists and turns but we will get there and we will get there together. it is nice to hear you end that on a hopeful note. it is important for all of us to end this year on a hopeful note, even though it s sometimes pretty hard. i appreciate you coming on especially talking about the challenges that our children are having with mental health, because this pandemic. i hope you have a happy new year to. thanks, and i hope you do as well, dana, and i hope everyone out there who is liste
children, are feeling increasingly pessimistic, vaccine resistance remains high, more than 1,000 people are dying every day. what do you say to americans who fear that the pandemic is just never going to end and that this is the new normal? certainly i can understand that fatigue and the frustration that many people have about where we are in the pandemic right now. it has been almost two years. we ve lost so many people and our lives have been changed fundamentally, but those struggles shouldn t obscure one critical thing, which is that we have made tremendous progress in these last two years as well. studies recently done, in fact, we have saved more than a million lives because of vaccination efforts this past year alone. i know it may not always feel like progress is enough, but we ve also gotten tools and developed tools to learn to live our lives to gather with family and friends, and those include not just the vaccines and the boosters, but testing, using masks judiciously, an