US President Joe Biden, on Monday, urged Americans to get vaccinated against COVID-19 while specially requesting those who had been waiting for the approval of the United States Food and Drug Administration, describing it as the “gold standard”.

The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine was given the “full and final” approval on Monday, after which Biden tagged the jab as “safe and effective”.

In Monday’s public address, Biden said, “If you are one in millions of Americans who said that they will not get the shot until it has full and final approval of the Food and Drug Administration, it has now happened.”

He added, “The moment you have been waiting for is here. It is time for you to go and get your vaccination.”

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The President went on to shed light on the severity of COVID-19’s Delta variant and labelled the spread as “the pandemic of the unvaccinated”.

Biden added, “While we are starting to see initial signs that cases may be declining in a few places, nationwide cases are still rising, especially among the unvaccinated. Across the country, virtually all the COVID-19 hospitalisations and deaths continue to be among the unvaccinated. That is worse in states where vaccination rates are overall low.”

Biden also spoke about the rising concern of parents as students, who are largely unvaccinated against coronavirus get back to schools. He assured that United States Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona will be kept in the loop about decisions relevant to the safe return of students to American schools. 

According to the data available on the website of the United State Centres for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday afternoon, the country has recorded 37,583,545 cases of COVID-19, out of which 625,375 were fatal. The data also shows that nearly 73% of American residents have been administered with at least one shot of the available vaccines.