President Joe Biden announced a new vaccination goal: roughly half the American population by July 4. Biden administration officials said that the goal will be to apply at least one COVID-19 shot to 70 percent of adults in the nation and to get 160 million adults fully vaccinated by Independence Day. “If we make progress towards this goal, more and more Americans will gain protection from COVID-19 … and America will have taken a serious step toward a return to normal,” one official told reporters on a conference call. The goal comes as authorities are encountering increasing opposition against the vaccine due to hesitation over concerns of side effects, safety, efficacy, the speed at which it was made ready, mistrust in pharmaceutical companies, aversion to vaccine passports, and the lack of full FDA approval. The official noted that 105 million Americans are currently fully vaccinated and more than 56 percent …