Biden sets new vaccine goal of 200M shots within his first 100 days

President Biden on Thursday announced a new goal of having 200 million COVID-19 inoculations given within his first 100 days in office.

Video Transcript

JOE BIDEN: Good afternoon. Before I take questions I want to give you a progress report to the nation on where we stand 65 days into office here on vaccinations and a few other top priorities for the American people. First on vaccinations, on December 8th, I indicated that I hoped to get 100 million shots in people's arms in my first 100 days. We met that goal last week by day 58, 42 days ahead of schedule.

Now today I'm setting a second and goal and that is we will by my 100th day in office, have administered 200 million shots in people's arms. That's right, 200 million shots in 100 days. I know it's ambitious, twice our original goal. But no other country in the world has even come close, not even close to what we are doing. I believe we can do it. And today we made a historic investment in reaching the hardest hit and the most vulnerable communities, the highest risk communities as a consequence of the virus by investing an additional $10 billion in being able to reach them.

I also set a goal before I took office of getting a majority of schools in K through eight fully open in the first 100 days. Now thanks to the enormous amount of work done by our administration, educators, parents, local, state education officials, and leaders, recent Department of Education survey shows that nearly half of the K through eight schools are open now full time, five days a week for in-person learning. Not yet a majority, but we're really close and I believe in the 35 days left to go we'll meet that goal as well.