The United States will lift the Covid-19 vaccination requirement for federal employees and international travelers arriving by air on the evening of 11 May, the White House announced on Monday.
The lifting of the requirement corresponds to the end of the state of health emergency declared by Washington in January 2020.
The United States is officially the country that has paid the highest price for the pandemic, with more than one million deaths.
Since January 2021, i.e. since President Joe Biden’s inauguration, deaths from Covid-19 have declined by 95% and hospitalisations by almost 91%, the US executive branch said in a statement.
It added that since 270 million Americans have received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, the US is no longer in the same phase of pandemic response that it was when the obligations were put in place.
The measures taken to contain the Covid-19 pandemic, and in particular the vaccine obligation, gave rise to fierce political debates in the US.
