
The White House announced on Friday that it would be lifting the travel restrictions it imposed on eight southern African countries last month following the discovery of the COVID-19 Omicron variant.
President Biden will lift the restrictions on December 31, just one month after the bans were first announced, said White House assistant press secretary Kevin Munoz, according to The Hill.
Munoz noted that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that the restrictions be lifted.
“The restrictions gave us time to understand Omicron and we know our existing vaccines work against Omicron, especially boosted,” he wrote on Twitter.
The Biden administration announced the restrictions on South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi last month to try and tame the spread of Omicron.
A senior administration official told CNN that the CDC ultimately recommended lifting the restrictions because of progress health experts have made in understanding the Omicron variant, and because of how much the strain has spread across the globe.
The CDC said earlier this week that Omicron is now the dominant version of the coronavirus in the US, accounting for 73% of new infections last week.
On Monday, the US recorded its first death from the Omicron variant, an unvaccinated Houston man in his 50s with underlying health conditions.
(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)