this is bbc news. we'll have the headlines and all the main news stories for you at the top of the hour as newsday continues, welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. last month, president biden told americans the covid pandemic was over. a striking statement, given that us covid deaths are still running at an average of close to 400 a day. the overall covid death toll in the states has topped 1 million. on many measures, america's pandemic performance has

been relatively poor. my guest is the soon—to—retire chief medical adviser to president biden, dr anthony fauci, the scientist at the centre of america's covid storm. what lessons has he learned? dr anthony fauci in bethesda, maryland, welcome to hardtalk. thank you. it's good to be with you. it's great to have you on the show. now, let's start with that big statement by president biden. "the pandemic is over," he declared. do you agree with that view?

well, certainly, if you're talking about the pandemic as a widespread disease throughout the world, it's not over. what the president was referring to... but it's understandable how there could have been some varied interpretations of that. he was referring to the very fulminant phase of the outbreak when, for example, in the united states, we were having about 800,000 to 900,000 infections a day and up to 3,000 to 4,000 deaths per day. we are not at that point now. we're much better off, but technically speaking, we still are in the middle of a pandemic, as you mentioned correctly in the beginning. we're having about 400 deaths per day, which is an unacceptably high level of deaths of any infectious disease, certainly any that we have experienced recently. and so we really have a ways to go before we can say we're

comfortable enough to feel that we're really out of this. we're not there yet. right. so i just wonder whether you think president biden�*s words are helpful, because it seems to me that, you know, many people, and i would have to say, maybe even at times, you have consistently underestimated covid's staying power, and maybe that's a recurring problem. well, it is. and one of the problems we're having is that we don't want that statement to be interpreted by people to say that we have to let and can let our guard down. we still have to do much better with vaccinations. you know, as a rich country, an enlightened country, we're not doing very well. we only have... ..about 68% of our population has been vaccinated and only one half of those have gotten their boost. we need to do much better than that. if you rank us among countries

in the world, even among low and middle—income countries, we are not at the top of the list in our compliance with getting our citizens vaccinated. so we need to do much better than that. right. isn't one big issue — and has been for the last two—and—a—half years — in america, the question of trust? the citizens' trust in the public officials who are organising the covid response. and maybe when biden said what he said, he's yet again sowing seeds of mistrust amongst the population. if 400 people are dying every day... i'lljust give you the words of one respected professor who writes on public health and medicine, josh barocas, who's a professor at the university of colorado school of medicine. he said, "you know what? "biden ran on the covid issue. "he ran on the science. "he ran on listening to scientists. "and if he truly believes it's over, he's now duping us. "that comment," says the professor, "was incredibly "damaging to public health." would you agree?

no, i think that's being a bit unfair. i don't know who that person is, but might have a political agenda. i'm not sure. the president could have used better words than that. but i don't want this to be a politicisation. everybody understands in the united states that president biden takes the covid outbreak very seriously, as do all of us. so i think we might be just stretching it a bit by essentially making something out of this which it is not. but in terms of the removal of some of... ..many of the restrictions, is there now, for you as a public health expert, is there an acceptable level of covid death? well, you know, it's very difficult to say an acceptable level of death. you do as best as you can to get the level of morbidity and mortality as low as possible.

you have to accept some reality and take a look at the various stages of control of an outbreak. for example, we're not going to eradicate sars—cov—2. we've only eradicated one infectious disease in the history of global health, and that's smallpox, because we had, with smallpox, a virus that doesn't change or vary, it's rather stable. and the protection that's induced by either infection or vaccination is durable to the point of measured in decades, if not a lifetime. the next question is, can we eliminate it the way we have eliminated measles and polio in the united states and the uk and in other developed nations? and the chances are, we're not going to completely eliminate it.

and again, the reason being is that, unlike polio and measles, which are very stable and don't change and which, in fact, degree of immunity it imparts is quite durable, we don't have that with covid, in which the variants continue to occur every several months, and the durability of the protection is measured in months as opposed to decades. right. so just... sorry to interrupt, butjust to be clear, then, one key point you seem to be making is that we must expect new variants. we always have to be anticipating that we will see variants, because, historically, over the last three years, we've seen multiple variants. but getting back to what i was saying a moment ago, what can we hope for? we can hope for a level of control of the infection that's low enough that it doesn't disrupt the social order the way it has over the last two and three—quarter yea rs.

and you can do that by getting much greater proportion of the global population vaccinated and boosted so that, hopefully, after a period of time, there will be enough of a level of immunity that even if you do get new variants, there would be enough cross—reactivity to protect you, at least against severe disease, which brings up the point of needing, very likely, although we don't know for sure, we very likely would need a regular enhancing of immunity by a booster shot similar to what we do every year with influenza, so that you can continue to get the level of immunity throughout the world at a level enough that you don't get serious disease. i believe, though i don't know for sure, that we're heading towards that, towards a cadence where

you get, like, seasonal vaccinations similar to what we do with flu. but as you've already pointed out to me, america's vaccination rate, compared to many parts, certainly of the wealthy world, is very poor. and your overall covid performance, frankly, if you look at many measures, is poor in relative terms. why do you think that is? well, there are a number of complicated reasons why that's the case. i can tell you a few that are clear. one, the health care system in our country is one that leads to health disparities, particularly when you're talking about minority populations, brown and black people, who not only have, because of the levels of their employment and their economic situation, have a higher level of chance of getting infected. and when they do get infected, they have a higher level of underlying conditions —

hypertension, obesity, diabetes — which render them more susceptible to complications that lead to hospitalisations and death. that's the first thing. but probably something that's even more important than that is the fact that we have an extraordinary amount of divisiveness in my country, political divisiveness, which has spilled over into our response to a public health crisis. it is really unacceptable and in many cases really unprecedented, that you have the acceptability of very proven interventions such as vaccination are determined by one's political ideology. it's very clear that that's the case in the united states. if you look at the states or regions of the country that are what we call red states or predominantly republican or right leaning, the level

of vaccination in those places is far less than the level of vaccination in those areas of the country which are centre left or blue states. that is a fascinating phenomenon, and it points again to this word "trust", and that, in many ways, the federal government and key officials dealing with the covid response, such as yourself, were clearly not trusted by a significant portion of the population. would you accept that you made some pretty significant missteps in the way you communicated your public health messages at the beginning and during the course of this pandemic response? well, help me out. tell me what you think was a misstep and then perhaps i can respond to it. well, let's start with masks and your message on the efficacy of mask—wearing. you appeared at the beginning to suggest it really wasn't very important,

that masks made very little difference and there wasn't much point people wearing them. only later did you concede that there was significant evidence that masks really did matter. yeah, and that was because the evidence was changing. certainly, i take responsibility for the fact that that message in the beginning was not the correct message. but if you look at the circumstances and the data and evidence upon which we based that particular message, it had to do with a number of factors. first of all, there was felt to be a shortage of good masks in the country, that we did not want to get people hoarding masks and taking them away from the health care providers who needed them. the second thing, it was not fully appreciated that outside of the health care setting, namely the hospital setting, that masks actually were effective. and, importantly, it wasn't

appreciated at the time at all that the virus was spread by aerosol as well as droplets, and even more importantly, that about 50% to 60% of the transmissions were from someone with no symptoms at all. that's what we thought at the time. right. so your contention is the evidence changed and your opinion changed with the evidence? exactly. yeah, i get that. 0k. you say you want specifics. here's another one. and that's your view on the importance of getting as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible. you said in public, if america could get 75% of the public vaccinated, you believed that that would deliver a very strong chance of establishing herd immunity. other scientists questioned that. and then you backed off and you said, "ah, well, i wasn't really telling the truth "because in my own mind "i knew the figure had to be much closer to 90%.

"but i daren�*t say that to the american public "because i felt it might discourage them from actually "making the effort to go and get a vaccination." was it your role to second—guess how the american public might respond to the actual truth? well, i actually have to, with all due respect to you, say you are misconstruing. what i said really rather significantly... 0k. so the issue of herd immunity... and that's unfortunate that you're doing that. i would hope that you would not, but you did. so let's address it. the issue is that the idea of herd immunity is based on the fact that once you get infected that you are then protected against re—infected. we did not know until it became clear to me and others, and i was always transparent, based on the data that we had at a given time, that this virus is very unusual,

because once you do get infected, you don't have a durable degree of immunity that you have, for example, when you get infected or vaccinated with measles or smallpox or polio. it was a very unique experience to see that we were dealing with a situation where, if you got infected, a virus could change or drift the way we have seen multiple times now over the last two and three—quarter years with covid. those are things that are evolving. and it gets back to, i think, the fundamental principle of the difference between what you're saying and what i'm saying. certainly, if we had known things at the time that they were happening that we know now, retrospectively, we would have made different statements and different recommendations.

but all we had to deal with was the data and the evidence at the time. i understand what you are saying about decision—making at the time and how difficult it was. but one more specific, if i may, and, again, based on some critics' belief that you didn't always level with the american people, and it became a very big partisan one, this one, because it concerns china, and what your critics say was a flip—flop from you on whether you would countenance the possibility that the covid pandemic originated from a lab leak in wuhan, china. you dismissed that, your critics say, early in the pandemic. you said that it was nothing more than a conspiracy theory. but by the middle of last year, you changed your mind and said that it was well worth investigating the possibility of a lab leak. why did you change? well, again, i believe — again, with all due respect — i got to get back at

you for this. you're really misconstruing what happened. so let me respond to you. i have always, always kept an open mind that there is any possibility. the point that i was making — because something is possible, it doesn't mean it's probable. and what people were saying was there's an equal likelihood that it was a lab leak as it was a natural occurrence. and what happened over a period of months to most recently, very well put together, peer—reviewed papers by a large group of international scientists and evolutionary virologists with no agenda have come to the conclusion that, although we all, myself included, still keep an open mind, it looks like the likelihood

and the evidence that is accumulating that this is a natural occurrence far, far outweighs any evidence, if any — and there may be no evidence at all — except conjecture that this is a lab leak. so i repeat what i've always said. i keep an open mind and i'm always open to new data and new evidence. but the scientific data now, though not absolutely conclusive, strongly points to a natural occurrence. that is the reality, not the way you spelled it out, with all due respect, sir. in reflective mood, how do you think, in future, the situation where a hugely influential science voice such as yourself becomes the figure of such political partisan debate? how can that be avoided in future? i'm sure you saw the poll at some point last year, where 52% of the american public, according to polls, wanted to see you fired. but you're a non—partisan

scientist. how can america get out of that situation? right. there is no easy solution to that. and it is an unfortunate reflection of the profound degree of political divisiveness in my country, which is very unfortunate. where truth does not matter, where unreality and distortion is clear, you can see that, even if you're paying a little bit of attention to what's going on in my country, where you have tens of millions of people who believe that the election was stolen and that president biden is not the valid president, when the overwhelming investigation into that clearly indicates that this was about as fair and well—scrutinised

election as we've ever had in the country. and then there are many, many people who believe that the assault on our democracy onjanuary 6th was something that either didn't happen or wasn't particularly important. when you have that kind of divisiveness... right. let me finish. when you have that kind of divisiveness in the country, you bring up the point of, quote, my popularity, and people saying i'm a divisive figure. well, i'm a divisive figure because i'm telling the truth when i say that hydroxychloroquine does not work, and other people say it does. am i the divisive figure when all the data shows that it doesn't work? no. listen, it's a very fair question. i'm just very mindful, in your long career, and much of your career was devoted to fighting, combatting hiv/aids in the us

and around the world, at the beginning of the hiv/aids crisis, many of the activists who wanted us government action to help combat the terrible toll, they were disappointed in you. some of them were furious with you. they called you a murderer. but you found ways over years to reach out to those people like the activist writer larry kramer and many others, and you actually became friends with them, even though they'd at one point called you a murderer. can you imagine an america where you somehow are able to reach out...? you've alluded to donald trump, to your other opponents, most of them are republican, who castigated you. is there any way to build bridges? i hope so. but that would have to really be dependent on people putting aside this profound degree of divisiveness, because, remember, when you talk about republicans, my most enjoyable and productive interactions have been

in the more than 50 years that i have been at the nih and at the more than 38 years that i have been the director of the institute, those have been with republicans equally to democrats. for example, i had the honour and the privilege of establishing and being the principal architect of the president's emergency plan for aids relief, or pepfar, which was, in fact, made possible by my interaction and collaboration with president george w bush. right. clearly a conservative republican. so i think to say republican versus democrat, it is not really correct to do that, because the degree of divisiveness in our country is founded in untruths and distortion. and that theme, if i may say so, dr fauci, has come over loud and clear

in this interview. do you think that when you leave thisjob, given the divisiveness that you have seen and the direct threats and intimidation that you and your family have faced, do you think that you can live a safe and serene life in this united states that you describe when you leave your currentjob? well, i hope so. i still have federal agent protection because of the ridiculous situation where i and other public health officials continually have our life and our safety and that of our families threatened. there's something very, very wrong with that picture. would you not agree? i would. and ijust wonder whether you see any end to it. well, i hope so. i hope... i have a great deal of faith in the ultimate emergence of the better angels in our spirit and in our country. and i do hope that, after a period of time,

we do settle into a situation where we have differences, which are healthy, differences are healthy, i think that's an important part of a democracy, but that those differences don't turn into the kind of conflicting divisiveness that we've seen. hopefully that will improve. the better part of my feeling towards humanity makes me optimistic that it will, but that remains to be seen. well, dr anthony fauci, we thank you very much indeed forjoining us on hardtalk. thanks a lot. my pleasure. good to be with you.

hello there. 0ur weather story is becoming a little bit more unsettled as we head towards the weekend. no two days the same at the moment, not only in terms of weather, but also the feel of things, both by day and night. now, for thursday, many of us will see some sunny spells, but there will be blustery, squally showers developing in the far north—west. over the next few hours, we'll start to see this weather front easing away from channel coasts. it mightjust continue to bring a little bit of early—morning rain on thursday. look at the temperatures — double digits because of the cloud and the rain around. further north, though, it's going to be a chilly start, with a touch of light frost in rural parts. but as we go through the day, there will be a good slice of dry and sunny weather to look out for for most of us. into the afternoon, however, the winds will strengthen, we'll see some squally showers developing into northern ireland and north—west scotland in particular. elsewhere, temperatures pretty similar to the last few days

by the middle of the afternoon. we're looking at highs of 11—17 celsius — that's 63 fahrenheit. now, that weather front will continue to move its way steadily south and east, weakening all the time. it's going to be replaced by another one moving through scotland and northern ireland as well. at the same time, there's the potentialfor a little bit of showery rain once again, just clinging on to channel coasts first thing on friday. sandwiched in between the two, we should see some drier, brighter interludes, and behind, it's going to be bright and breezy with showers. so, friday's a really messy story, a real autumnal story of blustery showers. warm in the sunshine still, with 17 degrees the high. now, low pressure never too far away as we head into the weekend. plenty of isobars, particularly the further north you go. gusts of wind, 40—50 mph, and they're going to be driving weather fronts in around those areas of low pressure. so, saturday is going to be a case of sunny spells and squally showers, the showers most frequent out towards the west,

but some of those will start to push a little bit further inland as the day continues. favoured spots for the best of the drier weather, parts of aberdeenshire and perhaps through south—east england as well. and here, we'll see highs again of around 11—17 celsius. not much change as we go into sunday and monday. the winds stay blustery from a warm source, plenty of showers to dodge as well. take care.

welcome to newsday, reporting live from singapore. i'm karishma vaswani. the headlines: ajury orders conspiracy theorist alexjones to pay more than $900 million to the families of the victims of the sandy hook massacre. urgent action is required to reverse biodiversity destruction — the stark warning from the world wide fund for nature after wildlife populations decline by almost 70% in 50 years. have you wrecked the economy, prime minister? time for another u—turn? the british prime minister

insists she won't cut public spending, to pay for her multibillion—pound