[ad_1]
About 19.1 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine have been administered in the United States of the nearly 40 million distributed as Biden’s new administration ramps up inoculation efforts.
New York-based emergency doctor Dr Steven McDonald described the current situation as a battle between the vaccine rollout and the coronavirus continuing to spread through the population.
“It’s hard to say which of these forces will win more quickly,” McDonald said on Yahoo Finance Live (video above). “I would say from now on the virus wins. Vaccine rollout is so late where we need it. “
The country recently passed 400,000 deaths from COVID earlier this week, and public health officials expect a further increase in cases as a new, more contagious strain of coronavirus becomes dominant in the United States
For the country to achieve collective immunity, which would allow a return to normal, between 80 and 90% of the population must be vaccinated. So far, about 5% of the American population has been vaccinated.
The goal of the Biden administration is to vaccinate 1 million Americans per day for the first 100 days of Biden’s presidency. President Biden was planning to invoke the Defense Production Act to speed up vaccine production.
“Strengthening vaccine supply chains will be key to tackling this,” McDonald said.
“ It’s hard to tell that something is under control ”
The new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Dr Rochelle Walensky, warned that there are “dark weeks” for the country and predicted that the United States will cross the tally of 500,000 deaths in ‘here mid-February. McDonald’s echoed a similar sentiment.
“As long as the numbers in the United States remain 100,000, 200,000 people affected every day, it’s hard to say anything is under control,” McDonald said. “Even if things are moving in the right direction, the magnitude of these numbers suggests that it is beyond our control.”
He added: “I really think a vaccine will be the only thing that can kind of hold it back, because we have put in place public health measures that don’t seem to be working so far.”
The spread of the coronavirus did not discriminate based on geographic location – California faces an overwhelming number of cases, as does the Dakota and parts of the Northeast. Several of the states that have seen flare-ups have put in place mask warrants and other restrictions, but they haven’t been as effective in recent months as more people congregate inside due to cooler weather.
“When it comes to stopping the spread and what people can do, the main source of the spread is what’s called ‘living room spread’,” McDonald said. “This is when people who you suspect are safe, but who have actually been exposed, get infected, even though they don’t have symptoms. This is how it really spreads. “
Public health experts have attributed the surge in the holidays in the cases largely to indoor gatherings. If this trend continues, McDonald said, the United States will be forced to maintain restrictions throughout the year until the vaccine rollout is complete.
“Until we can sort of get a handle on that, which would mean regulating individual behavior, we’re really not going to get any idea of how transferable this is,” McDonald said, adding, “I haven’t. crystal ball but if the tariffs continue as they are, I think [we’ll be] remain isolated and subject to these public health restrictions for the remainder of the year. Having said that, I hope we learn from our mistakes and have a much more efficient deployment in the spring. “
Adriana is a reporter and editor covering health policy and politics for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @adrianambells.
READ MORE:
Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard, SmartNews, LinkedIn, Youtube, and reddit.
[ad_2]
Source link