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The United States should be able to distribute enough doses of the coronavirus vaccine to immunize 100 million people by the end of February, President Donald Trump’s Covid-19 vaccine czar said on Wednesday.
These will be doses sufficient to protect a “significant portion” of Americans most at risk, including the elderly, healthcare workers and those with pre-existing illnesses, Dr Moncef Slaoui, who heads the immunization program of The Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed, told reporters at a press briefing.
There is a chance that the United States may have more doses than expected this month if Johnson & Johnson’s potential vaccine is cleared by then, Slaoui said, adding that he expects the company releases key late testing data in January.
The federal government is expected to ship 6.4 million doses of Pfizer vaccine to jurisdictions across the country within 24 hours after an emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration, Army General Gustave Perna, chief of operations for Operation Warp Speed, said at the same briefing. Authorities plan to ship 12.5 million doses of Moderna’s vaccine following an emergency clearance, he added.
Planning “is not about getting in front of the EUA,” Perna told reporters. “He makes sure everything is on lockdown. So when the decisions of the EUA come, the distribution to the American people becomes immediate.”
Wednesday’s briefing came as states prepare to distribute a Covid-19 vaccine in as little as two weeks. Moderna and Pfizer at the end of last month applied for emergency clearances from the FDA for their Covid-19 vaccines. FDA reviews are expected to take a few weeks, and the agency has scheduled a meeting on December 10 to discuss Pfizer’s clearance application.
Earlier Wednesday, the UK became the first country to authorize the Pfizer vaccine for emergency use, marking a new milestone in the global battle against the pandemic.
Initial doses will be limited as manufacturing increases, with top U.S. health officials predicting that it will take months to vaccinate anyone wishing to be vaccinated against Covid-19 in the United States. The federal government has made agreements with several drug manufacturers to purchase some of their first doses.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention panel on Tuesday voted 13-1 to give healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities in the United States the first doses of the coronavirus vaccine once it is authorized for public use. There are approximately 21 million healthcare workers and 3 million residents of long-term care facilities in the United States, according to the CDC.
Medical experts have previously advocated that healthcare workers receive the vaccine first, followed by vulnerable Americans – the elderly, people with pre-existing illnesses and essential workers. Children and young adults should receive the vaccine last.
Ahead of the vote, Dr Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Disease, said most states and local jurisdictions expect all their health workers to be vaccinated. three weeks. Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require two doses approximately one month apart. Both vaccines use messenger RNA, or mRNA, technology. It’s a new approach to vaccines that uses genetic material to elicit an immune response.
Perna said on Wednesday that the federal government had asked states to finalize distribution plans by the end of this week.
States have already submitted plans to the CDC on how they plan to vaccinate some 331 million Americans against Covid-19 once a vaccine is approved. The CDC has allocated $ 200 million to jurisdictions for vaccine preparation, although much of that funding has not gone to the local level.
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