Announcing the measures on his first full day in power, he said drastic action is needed.

It will include tightening rules on wearing masks in public testing will be stepped up and travelers to the U.

S will have to test negative and quarantine on arrival.

Biden also wants to speed up the vaccination program.

He's warning, though, that the pandemic will get worse in the coming weeks.

With the death toll likely to rise from 400,000 to half a million next month, taking charge of bringing the pandemic under control, this next one is keeping workers safe.

How do you do that?

A day into his new job, President Biden signed a raft of executive orders to ramp up the federal response to the coronavirus.

For the past year, we couldn't rely on the federal government to act with the urgency and focus and coordination we needed, and we have seen the tragic cost of that failure.

Yes, over 400,000 people have now died in the US on, Biden warns.

The toll is likely to rise toe half a million in February.

But he hopes the strategy he's putting in place will eventually save many lives in.

Our national strategy is comprehensive.

It's based on science, not politics.

It's based on truth, not denial, and it's detailed.

Our plan starts with mounting an aggressive, safe and effective vaccination campaign to meet our goal of administering 100 million shots and our 1st 100 days in office.

We're on day one.

This will be one of the greatest operational challenges our nation has ever undertaken.

Three U S.

Is currently administering almost a million doses a day, but the rollouts has bean Rocky and several states have complained of scarce supplies.

Biden's deploying the Defense Production Act to help vaccine manufacturers increase production.

He's also implementing measures to improve distribution.

And after being effectively banished from Trump administration briefings, the nation's top infectious diseases doctor is back.

Anthony Fact.

She says he feels liberated.

The science can now speak.

He's optimistic.

Vaccines can suppress the virus despite new variants emerging.

Just if we get 70 to 85% of the country vaccinated, let's say by the end of the summer, middle of the summer, I believe, by the time we get to the fall, we will be approaching a degree of normality.

It's not gonna be perfectly normal, but one that I think will take a lot of pressure off the American public.

The message from the Biden administration is clear.

Hope is on the horizon, but it will still take many months to overcome the pandemic on the devastation it has wrought.

DWS William Glue Croft is covering this story for us.

William What's different about Joe Biden's approach to fighting the coronavirus compared to what we saw under Donald Trump?

I think we heard about it right there in the report.

The in a word science Biden already said during the campaign and when he was president elect that he would let science dictate the agenda and not politics like we saw so often under the Trump administration.

Not just politics, but Trump's own wishes and things that would make him look go to the thought that he would look good.

Ah, we also heard in the report how Dr Anthony Fauci, who is the White House, is chief science advisor or infectious disease adviser, saying he feels liberated that science is going to lead the way that basically he can come to a meeting to advise the president, Biden and his advisers on what to do and if he doesn't know, it's OK to say, You don't know, You don't have to make things up just to satisfy him.

That said, this is a very ambitious rollout.

Independent science and medical people are saying 100 million doses is a ambitious and b might not even be enough.

It's also uncertain.

100 million doses means 100 million people, or it means 50 million people if they're going to go the two dose route.

Um, there's also in an enormous amount of federal agencies that that the U.

S government can deploy that we'll have to see if really will happen.

For example, OSHA, That's the federal agency that oversees workplace safety.

They've been almost a wall throughout this entire pandemic.

Well, to see if Joe Biden turns thio, this agency is just one example to make sure that places that workplaces are safe for workers, so a lot to see how this 100 day plan really really works out well.

Biden's plan also includes a strong emphasis on mask wearing, for example, How receptive do you think Americans will be to his new approach?

It seems Americans have for a long time just mostly needed consistent messaging from their elected leaders.

Polls show that a majority of Americans take this pandemic seriously and disapproved of Donald Trump's handling of it on DSO.

Really, what's needed here is consistent, strong science based messaging.

And while the federal government and Joe Biden is somewhat limited, what they can dio because state and local authorities have a lot of authority when it comes thio health measures and, for example, enforcing masks, they could definitely set the tone that creates mawr of a universal response, uh, to the pandemic.

William.

Thank you very much.

That was DWS William Blue Cross.

Well, here's a look at some of the other developments worldwide in the coronavirus pandemic.

Germany's public health body, the Robert Koch Institute, says more than 50,000 people in Germany have now died from coronavirus in Spain.

The easing of travel restrictions over Christmas to allow families to get together caused a huge spike in infections.

Intensive care admissions have increased by 60% in the last two weeks, and the number of people dying by suicide in Japan has risen for the first time in over a decade as the pandemic reverses years of progress combating AH high suicide rate pence.