On May 11, 2023 the US HHS released details of their ‘Project NextGen’ Initiative, with an initial investment $5 billion, for the development of a new generation tools to enhance preparedness for “future COVID-19 strains and variants“. To be coordinated by BARDA and NIAID. So no longer do we have just variants, we also have “strains”! [1, 2, 3, 4]
The COVID-19 Public Health Emergency (PHE) officially ended in the U.S. the same day on May 11, 2023.