Lollapalooza was approved weeks before the event. Officials say that Lollapalooza was authorized based on information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and messages from the White House. Event organizers asked that all attendees show proof of vaccination or a negative Covid Test within the past 72 hours to ensure safety.It is also held outdoors, helping to reduce transmission. Cook County was just added to the CDC's areas with significant Covid spread, despite hospitalizations rising by 35%. With the new mask guidance by the administration and the revelations about the Delta variant, local politicians and medical experts were already bracing for the worst.This could be a very spreader event, according to Chicago Alderman Chris Taliaferro. He is a member the Chicago councils Progressive Reform Caucus. We may have to deal with its aftermath, unfortunately.The White House's plans for late summer and autumn have been disrupted by the Delta variant's emergence, as evidenced by the growing anxiety in Chicago. The next chapter of the disease has darkened a season that was supposed to celebrate the great reopening. It has put the Biden administration in a crossroads. They are eager to praise a country that is making progress, but they are divided over how to deal with the new virus threat and what steps Americans should take.Top Biden officials point out that breakthrough infections among vaccinated people are extremely rare, unlikely to cause serious complications, and more common in crowded indoor environments. They are frustrated at the overly alarmist coverage of these cases.Officials are still concerned about the spread of Delta virus to unvaccinated people. The CDC is still investigating several questions regarding Delta, including how asymptomatic people can transmit the virus to others. This raises questions about the safety of mask-wearing individuals.All of this amounts to a very grim political outlook for Biden. The White House planned to focus its attention on infrastructure, jobs, and the economy. It is now faced with questions about schools' operations this fall, as well as fears from housing advocates regarding the expiration Saturday of an eviction moratorium. This was after the White House was slow in calling for a legislative fix. These advocates fear that it could further hinder the fight against the pandemic.Sawyer Hackett is the executive director of Julian Castros People First Future PAC. Castro was a former secretary at the department of Housing and Urban Development. It's not only poverty, evictions, and homelessness that are causing this surge of new variants to spread like wildfire.This week's situation was so dire that a long-time Democratic operative suggested to Biden that he should issue a formal address to Congress to clarify where the fight against the pandemic is at.Simon Rosenberg, a long-standing party official, stated that things are confusing at the moment. There is a lot of anger and frustration. Reopening schools is going to be difficult.The CDC and White House have been at odds since the emergence and spread of the Delta variant. This has led to friction within the administration. Two top Biden officials who were familiar with the matter stated that the administration is still trying balance messaging so that it emphasizes the severity and reassures that everyone is safe.One senior administration official stated that we thought we would move on from this. It's like we are back at square one.Particularly the revised mask mandate has been a difficult issue. The White House and Department of Health and Human Services both questioned whether Americans should be urged to wear masks again in order to fight the pandemic. Some officials met over the past week to argue that changing guidelines could cause confusion and provoke political backlash.CDC Director Rochelle Walensky argued the contrary, citing data from her own department. Biden officials, including Anthony Fauci, the Chief Medical Officer, were urged by Walensky to issue new recommendations encouraging fully vaccinated Americans indoors to wear masks. They cited more recent data about the spread of the Delta variant and the virus levels in both vaccinated individuals and those who had not been vaccinated. Two senior officials who were present at the conversation said Walensky insists that there is no alternative to doing nothing.Walensky is supported by the president and other senior officials like Fauci, but both her office as well as the White House have privately expressed dissatisfaction with each other.These frustrations were reaffirmed when the White House and senior health officials disagreed over data regarding an outbreak of unvaccinated people in Cape Cod. Although only a few people who had been immunized were infected, it was alarming to see the number of infected among those who were. Officials debated whether enough data had been collected by the administration to allow them to ask Americans to use masks indoors to prevent the spread of the Delta variant. They also questioned whether they would follow the new guidelines.The mask guidance was eventually revised by the administration, which now requires that vaccinated persons wear protective face covers indoors in high-viral transmission areas. However, there are questions internally about the effectiveness of this new position.One administration official stated that we declared ourselves somewhat successful when they were able to tell vaccinated persons that they don't need to cover their faces. It's difficult to believe that we are going back.POLITICO spoke with federal officials who stressed that the Biden team knew they would need to change their approach as the Covid fight evolved and new variants were discovered. Senior administration officials noted that it is difficult to analyze real-time data about the evolution of a virus and then develop appropriate public health recommendations for more than 330 million people.Officials acknowledged that there were internal tensions. However, they also described it as a once in a generation pandemic. They said that Americans expected and deserved government that was based on science and data. The White House was encouraged by the increase in vaccination rates among unvaccinated this week (it was the strongest nation in first-shot vaccinations from early June), and believes that their message is starting to get heard. Businesses and the federal government may make more progress by implementing mandates or quasi-mandates that their employees get vaccinated.It is still a far cry from May when Biden declared an end to mask-wearing among vaccinated people and all but declared victory against Covid on Fourth of July. The White House now has to decide if they can go back or if too many people, not just in the blue states but also in the blue cities, are too willing to continue living as if the pandemic was over.Taliaferro stated that if he had known then what he now knows about Covid, the rapid spread and potential for breakthrough infections, as well as the ability of those who have been vaccinated to spread the disease, Chicago's City Council would have adopted a different approach.The alderman said that there were many factors that were not present at the time. We witnessed us almost emerge from a pandemic.Last week, Chicago's health commissioner, Allison Arwady, was asked if Lollapalooza could be a superpreader event. She replied that she believed the city was more responsible than large gatherings in the country.Arwady stated that he is certain we won't face a major problem.This view is not shared by everyone.In a statement about Lollapalooza Dr. Tina Tan, a Northwestern Feinberg School Of Medicine infectious disease expert, stated, "It's a recipe to disaster."
