'To heal, we must remember': Biden paid tribute to 400,000 Americans lost to COVID-19 with moving ceremony at Lincoln Memorial

biden lincoln memorial covid-19 lives lost — U.S. President-elect Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden attend a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) memorial event at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, U.S. January 19, 2021.
Tom Brenner/Reuters

President-elect Joe Biden honored the 400,000 lives lost to COVID-19 at a memorial on Tuesday.
A memorial was erected Tuesday at the Lincoln Memorial to honor the Americans who died from COVID-19.
Biden paid tribute to those lost to COVID-19 on the eve of his inauguration on January 20.
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President-elect Joe Biden paid tribute to the 400,000 lives that were lost due to COVID-19 on Tuesday at a memorial erected at the reflecting pool by the Lincoln Memorial.

The COVID-19 death toll in the US surpassed 400,000 earlier Tuesday, and more than 2 million cases have reported in the country.

"To heal, we must remember. It's hard sometimes to remember," Biden said. "But that's how we heal. It's important to do that as a nation."

"It's important to do that as a nation. That's why we're here today," the president-elect continued. "Between sundown and dusk, let us shine the lights on the darkness along the sacred pool of reflection and remember all who we lost."

Biden delivered remarks honoring the lives lost to the coronavirus disease on the eve of his inauguration on January 20.

The US hit the grim milestone in the wake of a sluggish nationwide vaccine rollout, despite the vaccine being developed in record time. The lack of coordination on the part of the federal government left states to fend for themselves in creating a distribution plan, resulting in a disastrous distribution.

"That's where the federal support could come - giving local leaders guidance on how to do this," Scott McNabb, who previously served as an epidemiologist with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told Insider's Hilary Brueck.

"Normally it should happen smoothly, quickly, without any controversy, and with an intent to try to get as many people vaccinated as possible."