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Biden moves up deadline for states to open COVID-19 vaccines to all adults

The president wants all US adults to be eligible for a shot by April 19.

Carrie Mihalcik Former Managing Editor / News
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Americans above the age of 16 will be eligible for a vaccine nationwide later this month.

Sarah Tew/CNET

President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced that he wants states to make all adults eligible for coronavirus vaccines by April 19, taking nearly two weeks off his previous May 1 deadline.

"We aren't at the finish line. We still have a lot of work to do. We still are in a life-and-death race against this virus," Biden said during a White House briefing Tuesday afternoon.

The Biden administration has been working to ramp up availability of COVID-19 vaccines, including increasing the number of pharmacies in the federal vaccine program from 17,000 to nearly 40,000 stores. The government is also working to open a dozen more federally run mass vaccinations sites. In March, Biden said the US was on track to have enough doses of COVID-19 vaccine for every adult in America by the end of May. 

In total, more than 167 million vaccines doses have been administered in the US, according to John Hopkins University, with over 48 million people being fully vaccinated. Three coronavirus vaccines have been rolled out in the US -- two-shot vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna as well as a one-shot vaccine from Johnson & Johnson -- after being authorized for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration. 

Biden visited a vaccination site in Alexandria, Virginia, on Tuesday and later delivered remarks on the state of vaccinations during a briefing at the White House. 

Here's where to get a COVID-19 shot and how to track how many vaccines are available in your state.

CNET reporter Corinne Reichert also contributed to this report.