Fauci says Omicron can ‘evade’ vaccine protection: ‘Absolutely get a booster’

However, he then added that booster shots appear to have a positive effect against Omicron and can help increase efficacy against the variant.

"The thing that's important is that [Omicron] appears to be able to evade some of the immune protection of things like monoclonal antibodies, convalescent plasma and the antibodies that are induced by vaccines. That's the sobering news,” Fauci told ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos on "This Week" over the weekend.

Fauci declared: "If you want to be optimally protected, absolutely get a booster."

"The somewhat encouraging news is that preliminary data show that when you get a booster, for example, a third shot of an mRNA, it raises the level of protection high enough that it then does do well against the Omicron," Fauci went on, continuing to push for Americans to get the COVID-19 booster shot.

Fauci reiterated that while it's too soon to conclude with certainty, it does also appear that the Omicron variant is not as severe as the Delta variant.

"We're getting anecdotal information … not necessarily confirmed yet, that the level of severity appears to be maybe a bit less than in the Delta. But there are a lot of confounding issues that it may be due to the underlying protection in the community due to prior infections," Fauci stated.