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The past two weeks have brought a wave of positive news about the effectiveness of the coronavirus vaccine from two of the great pioneers in development. Pfizer said this week that the final results of its trial showed that its vaccine had a 95% success rate (a week after initial results showed the vaccine to be over 90% effective). Moderna said this week that preliminary data from its vaccine showed 94.5% efficacy.
While the initial wave of free vaccines will most likely go to the country’s most vulnerable populations, herd immunity to effectively slow the spread of the virus requires around 70% of the population to be vaccinated.
How do you get the United States to reach that level?
The idea of paying Americans to take the vaccine was floated as a way to meet that 70% goal. Robert Litan, an economist who served in President Clinton’s administration, first proposed that the government spend $ 275 billion to pay Americans $ 1,000 each to achieve collective immunity of 80% in August. At the time, the prospect of a vaccine that was over 90% effective seemed overdone. Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he would “settle” for a vaccine that is 70-75% effective.
Paying $ 1,000 to take the coronavirus vaccine is the price of returning to “normal” post-pandemic life, Litan told Yahoo Finance.
The proposal highlights the risks of having a skeptical public about taking a new vaccine. Nearly two-thirds of Americans are worried about the accelerated COVID-19 vaccine, a product of Operation Warp Speed, according to a Yahoo Finance-Harris poll in October. Likewise, a Pew Research Center survey found that about half of American adults (51%) said “they would definitely or probably get a vaccine to prevent COVID-19 if it were available today; almost as many (49%) say they definitely would not or probably not get the vaccine right now. “
However, skepticism may ease: According to a recent Gallup poll, 58% of Americans said they would take the vaccine in October, up from 50% in September.
As coronavirus cases increase across the country and governors reimpose restrictions on businesses (and Thanksgiving gatherings), vaccines offer Americans hope for post-pandemic life.
Free vaccines for Americans are the best option, said Litan, who is a non-resident principal investigator at the Brookings Institution. However, as a plan B, he said, financial incentives should be offered to Americans reluctant to take the vaccine in order to achieve herd immunity.
“What we’re really talking about is converting these people to the limit, people who might be suspicious of the FDA. People who just don’t want to get the shot because it hurts, ”Litan said. “They worry about the effects of the shooting, etc., or… don’t want to bother going to the doctor or the hospital to get the shot. These are the people. These people represent perhaps 10 to 20% of the population. If we can return them and get them to take the picture, if we really need it, that’s who I think the payment is going to.
While there are fears that anti-vaxxers, members of the anti-vaccine movement, will refuse to take the vaccine, Litan believes herd immunity could be achieved without them. “I’m not counting on the money to convert a real anti-vaxxer,” he said. “We don’t really know what the true proportion of anti-vaxxers is in the total population, but I don’t think it’s as high as 30%.”
Litan warned against a federal vaccination mandate that would cause “a lot of anguish, even serious problems”.
“I would rather make people take the vaccine with honey rather than vinegar and pay them to do it. It’s just my personal preference and I think politicians will be more open to that than a mandate, ”he said. “For Main Street to get back to normal so that we can attend sporting events and our lives back to normal, I think that would be a small price to pay.”
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