progress reporter: but in the south and west, where omicron hit later, a different story entirely one of cases surging, setting new records and overrunning hospitals. but dr. anthony fauci says he s hopeful the country will soon see a turnaround possibly by mid february we don t want to get overconfident, but it looks like it s going in the right direction. reporter: there s a big caveat fauci predicting more pain and suffering in areas where fewer people are vaccinated and boosted. and josh joins us now from the national mall josh, was this protest against the vaccine itself or targeted more at the mandates reporter: well, they say it s about the mandates, but the speeches today were filled with misinformation about vaccine risks. we asked rally goers whether they, themselves, were vaccinated all but one of them told us they weren t kate josh, thank you believe it or not, tomorrow is the start of tax season, the first day you can file with the irs but there are warnings
0 of users. the administration needs back-up plans. one, to get the law chugging along somehow without accessible marketplaces in some states and one to manage the political fallout of nonfunctioning federal exchange which will be horrendous. do you think there are back-up plans in the works? look, reforming the way the nation gets health care is a difficult job. it s not all on jeff s shoulders. there s a huge team of folks at the white house, at hhs, cms, all over the federal government trying to make this work state by state. there s a deadline in place. i think knowing the president, knowing the team he s got around him, they are working like crazy. do you think president obama is learning how to code. i would not be surprised. give me the mouse. give me the computer machine. lets do this thing. look, yes, there is a political issue at play here. if you look where democrats stand right now, trying to get affordable health care for every single american, a website that we