Bill Cassidy: Americans ‘Lost Patience’ with CDC Coronavirus Guidelines

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) said during a hearing Tuesday that the American people have “lost patience” with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) delayed revising of its guidelines to reflect the millions of Americans taking the coronavirus vaccines.

The Louisiana senator decried the CDC’s “lagtime” between revising its recommendations for the coronavirus pandemic, which include when and where Americans should wear masks.

Cassidy, a doctor that has experience running vaccine programs, asked CDC Director Rochelle Walenksy, “If I’m vaccinated, and I have antibodies, and I’m exposed to somebody else, what is my risk with coming down with symptomatic infection?”

“Five percent,” Walensky said.

Cassidy countered that claim, saying that statistic references the overall population, not those who have been vaccinated and have antibodies.

The CDC director said that her agency did not check to see if everyone who got the vaccine also had antibodies.

Cassidy said that there are significant consequences to the CDC’s delayed updating of its coronavirus guidelines. He said:

If we know that herd immunity is somewhere north of 60 or 70 percent, if we go into a workplace where within that workplace there is 100 percent immunization such as here [Congress]. We’ve achieved herd immunity. Yeah there’s somebody in here that may not be responding to the vaccine but because everyone else has they’re protected. That’s nowhere reflected and right now we have federal agencies in which we’ve had employees not working for a year because the unions says that they need to have special workplace precautions for them to return to work. There is consequence to this kind of delay as this article shows of the kind of updating recommendations.

“The American people are incredibly frustrated, and as Sen. [Susan] Collins [R-ME] said, they’re beginning to disregard what you say that’s true. Because what you say is patently not true, I have to wear a mask when I’m outside, and the wind is blowing at 20 miles per hour, that’s been changed, but it’s only been changed recently. They seek not to believe those things which are true; you got to realize, you got to be more real-time,” he added.

Cassidy concluded, “The American people have just lost patience” with the CDC.

Sean Moran is a congressional reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @SeanMoran3.