Joe Biden Faces New Challenge Over Omicron Variant; Fury Grows as President Delays Travel Ban from South Africa

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WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 22: President Joe Biden (L) speaks as Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell (R) listens during an announcement at the South Court Auditorium of Eisenhower Executive Office Building on November 22, 2021 in Washington, DC. President Biden is nominating Powell to be the Chair of Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System for a second term and Lael Brainard, an incumbent member of the Board of Governors, to be the next Vice Chair.

After calling Donald Trump's comparable COVID-19 restrictions "racist," a Fox News presenter dubbed President Joe Biden a "fraud" for the latest travel ban, while others attacked Biden for delaying until Monday to block flights from Omicron-hit southern African nations.

The White House claimed earlier in the day that the president had been thoroughly briefed on the new super mutant variant Omicron and that the president's top health expert indicated he wouldn't be surprised if the strain were already in the US.

After a 30-minute conversation with Dr. Anthony Fauci on Friday, the president decided to impose a travel restriction on Monday for eight African countries: South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique, and Malawi. US nationals and green card holders from other African countries, on the other hand, will be able to come to the US.

Biden consults top medical experts before travel restriction delays

Although Biden issued his own travel restrictions earlier this week, he tweeted a different tune when he was running for the Democratic presidential nomination in February 2020. When the virus first spread, he chastised Trump for imposing visa limits on people from China and Europe. Meanwhile, travel between the United Kingdom and Israel was suspended on Thursday, and the EU followed suit, Daily Mail reported.

After placing seven nations in southern Africa on a red list - from which all tourists must go into hotel quarantine -, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has introduced further COVID-19 restrictions in reaction to the "monstrous" new Omicron variant.

On the second day after arrival in the UK, all passengers must undergo a PCR test and isolate at home until the results are received. All contacts of someone infected with the Omicron variant must isolate for ten days.

President Joe Biden said he spoke with his top medical experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, before delaying a restriction on travel to the US from nations in southern Africa, where the new Omicron variant of COVID-19 is quickly spreading.

Fauci warns possibility of the fifth wave of COVID-19

The president told reporters accompanying him on his Thanksgiving holiday vacation on Nantucket Island that the travel restrictions were put in place out of an excess of caution after the World Health Organization named Omicron a "variant of concern."

Per The Independent via MSN, Biden said, "because that was the recommendation coming from my medical team," when asked why the US was not following the lead of other nations that had adopted such limitations with immediate effect.

The news of fresh travel restrictions comes as the UK and EU countries deal with a new wave of illnesses, including two instances of Omicron in the UK.

Meanwhile, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Biden's chief medical advisor, cautioned that the United States might face a fifth wave of coronavirus illnesses, boosting the number of Americans vaccinated against the virus and receiving their booster injections could reduce the intensity of the outbreak.

Nearly 62 million Americans are eligible for COVID-19 vaccination. Still, they have not yet received their shots, according to Fauci, who is also the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Millions more who were immunized at least six months ago are now seeing their immunity wane, necessitating the need for booster shots, as per Big News Network.