Washington Post
Early last month, as the planned Fourth of July blowout at the White House approached, top health officials inside the Biden administration began calling each other with a flurry of anxious questions.
Would the president declare victory too soon? Would the event be seen as beating a virus that was not yet defeated? And would the massive party, with 1,000 guests, contribute to the virus’s spread?
While many in the White House had set their gaze on the present — eager to mark the progress that President Biden had made as coronavirus cases dipped below 12,000 per day for the first time since March 2020 — health officials were focusing abroad, where a new variant, delta, had sent cases skyrocketing. Even at home, in lightly vaccinated communities across Missouri and Arkansas, health officials were nervously watching cases rise, driven by delta.
