Dr. Anthony Fauci, recently casted on the recovery efforts taking place in many states across the country by suggesting that the United States will not return to normal until well into next year.

In a conversation with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Friday afternoon, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert said “normality” will not be achieved until a vaccine for COVID-19 is first developed and then widely distributed.

Fauci said he’s confident a vaccine will be available by the end of this year or early 2021.”By the time you mobilize the distribution of the vaccine and get a majority or more of the population vaccinated and protected, that’s likely not going to happen until the end of 2021,” he said. “If you’re talking about getting back to a degree of normality prior to COVID, it’s going to be well into 2021, towards the end of 2021.”