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Trump administration officials are in talks with Moderna to speed up the coronavirus vaccination process by giving people only half of the company’s recommended dose of the vaccine, a senior adviser said on Sunday.
Moncel Slaoui, chief scientific adviser for Operation Warp Speed, said there is evidence that giving people aged 18 to 55 two half doses “induces an immune response identical” to the dose. normal of 100 micrograms.
In an interview with Margaret Brennan on CBS’s “Face the Nation”, Slaoui said the strategy “exactly means achieving the goal of vaccinating double the number of people with the doses we have”.
But Slaoui also strongly championed the idea that people only need one shot instead of the current two-dose regimen, so it’s not clear how giving people two half-doses would be any different.
Slaoui’s comments come as the US vaccination program crawls out the door. The vaccine distribution was slower than expected and the actual vaccinations were even slower.
The administration failed to meet its goal of vaccinating 20 million people by the end of 2020. Only about 4 million Americans received the first of two doses, and just over 13 million doses were received. issued, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Logistics issues have hampered the Trump administration’s distribution efforts, with much of the crucial “last mile” of work falling on underfunded local health services.
States are struggling to administer the doses they already have, leading many experts to question a strategy that effectively doubles the availability of doses, but does not provide additional help to jurisdictions.
Slaoui told Brennan that he and other members of the administration assumed that when states order a specific number of doses, they have distribution plans in place.
“We assume that a vaccination plan is in place. We are here to respond to any specific request. We will do our best, as we have done over the past eight months, to make these vaccines. do it in people’s arms, ”Slaoui said.
Under the current federal plan, the administration’s Operation Warp Speed delivers only half the number of doses needed to states each week. The other half remains in a warehouse, held back to ensure there is enough supply for a second dose.
Given the inefficient deployment, health experts and federal officials have been looking for ways to speed up the process.
One option, recently adopted in the UK, is to prioritize everyone a first dose, delaying a second dose by three months.
Slaoui said he does not see this happening in the United States and questioned the science behind the delay.
Moderna and Pfizer were cleared in a two-dose form, and Slaoui said trials show the second dose gives an immune response 10 times greater than the first dose.
“We don’t have any data after a dose,” Slaoui said. Delaying the vaccination schedule “without any data I think would not be responsible,” he said.
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