Coronavirus live updates: America isn’t headed toward lockdowns, say

The Biden administration has sought to avoid imposing lockdowns and has instead relied on the increased distribution of vaccine shots to curb the coronavirus. Even when the spread of the delta variant this summer was driving up new cases, President Biden and his senior health officials stressed their goal of avoiding lockdowns. Zients repeated that stance Monday, pointing to the increasing number of Americans getting vaccinated. “We have the tools to accelerate the path out of this pandemic: widely available vaccinations, booster shots, kids’ shots, therapeutics,” he said.