3 Steps Biden Is Taking to Fix the Vaccine Rollout
As many as 514,000 Americans could die from the coronavirus pandemic by Feb. 20, 2021.
It's a message starkly different than the denialist coronavirus press briefings in 2020 under the Trump Administration. But today, in the Biden Administration's COVID-19 response team's first public health briefing, that was the grim projection made by Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the newly appointed director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
With that urgency in mind, federal health experts tasked with combating COVID-19 today introduced steps that the Biden Administration is taking to curb viral spread and get vaccinations into the arms of more Americans more quickly, writes my colleague Alice Park. Because of the inaction of the last administration, this one is not starting from a place of much strength: Andy Slavitt, senior advisor to the White House COVID-19 response team, said that the Biden administration did not inherit a "fully developed strategy or infrastructure to make vaccines readily available to Americans as quickly as they need to be."
Nevertheless, Biden and his experts have a plan for ramping up vaccination.
First, the White House is increasing the minimum number of doses it sends to the states each week from 8.6 million to 10 million, starting next week for the next three weeks. Second, moving forward, governors will know three weeks ahead of time how many doses their state will receive in order to help them prepare for distribution and plan for how many people can realistically be vaccinated. And third, the U.S. purchased 200 million more vaccine doses—100 million of Pfizer-BioNTech's vaccine, and 100 million of Moderna's—bringing the government's total from 400 million to 600 million. That means nearly all Americans should be able to be fully vaccinated by the end of the summer—and possibly sooner if the government authorizes vaccine candidates from other pharmaceutical companies in the meantime.
The Biden team is trying to improve vaccination in ways beyond just improving supply. During today's briefing, experts said that the Federal Emergency Management Agency is investing $1 billion in vaccination sites, including mobile sites, to vaccinate more eligible Americans and reach areas with less access to health care, which are disproportionately communities of color.
Vaccination is just one piece of the puzzle when it comes to fighting COVID-19. The U.S. remains way behind on its capacity to rapidly test for cases, sequence the genomes of new mutant strains and supply enough personal protective gear to everyone who needs it. But vaccinating everyone who wants to be is the best shot right now at stopping the spread, and the new administration's ambitious approach can't start soon enough.
While 32.7 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been shipped to various U.S. states as of this morning, only about 19.9 million doses have been administered thus far, according to TIME's vaccine tracker—representing 6% of the overall U.S. population.
AstraZeneca's vaccine doesn't yet have regulatory approval in the European Union, but the pharmaceutical company and the EU are already clashing over vaccine supply, Bloomberg reports . AstraZeneca warned of delays at its production plant, which sparked a fight between the company and the EU about contractual promises. Both sides agreed today to a call to resolve the issues. AstraZeneca's vaccine is expected to be approved by EU officials within days, and the company has promised to ship at least 3 million doses there immediately, but the pressure is on: vaccination in the EU has been slow so far, trailing that in the U.S. and the U.K.
French drugmaker Sanofi said yesterday that it would help Pfizer-BioNTech ramp up their vaccine production by manufacturing more than 100 million doses of the vaccine by the end of 2021 for use in Europe, the New York Timesreports. In an agreement with BioNTech, Sanofi will produce vials of the vaccine at its German plant beginning in July, CEO Paul Hudson told the French newspaper Le Figaro. Separately, Sanofi is also developing a vaccine with GlaxoSmithKline, but that shot has been underwhelming in early trials.
Starting tomorrow, Israel will begin vaccinating citizens ages 35 and up, reports Israeli newspaper Haaretz. Israel, which has reported 617,000 cases since the start of the pandemic, is leading the world in vaccinations, with more than 40% of its population inoculated so far.
TODAY'S CORONAVIRUS OUTLOOK
The Global Situation
More than 100 million people around the world had been diagnosed with COVID-19 as of 1 a.m. E.T. today, and more than 2.1 million people have died. On Jan. 26, there were 546,267 new cases and 17,264 new deaths confirmed globally.
Here's how the world as a whole is currently trending:
Here's where daily cases have risen or fallen over the last 14 days, shown in confirmed cases per 100,000 residents:
And here is every country with over 1.5 million confirmed cases:
The United Kingdom's COVID-19 death toll surpassed 100,000 yesterday, making it the smallest country to record a six-figure death count, my colleague Billy Perrigo reports . Half of those deaths have come since November, due in part to the rapid spread of a new highly transmissible—and potentially more deadly—variant. The government's inconsistent response to the pandemic, both early on and in December as cases rose precipitously, also deserves blame, experts believe. The U.K. is currently under a national lockdown, which seems to be working to slow the spread.
The mayor of Moscow lifted restrictions in the Russian capital today and said that the outbreak was declining there, the New York Timesreports. The city is now free of a nighttime curfew, and all employees are allowed to return to the office. But there's reason to doubt the rosy outlook: in December, a Russian state statistical agency found that the country's number of COVID-19 deaths was more than three times higher than officially reported.
The World Health Organization is advising pregnant women not to receive Moderna's vaccine unless they're health care workers or otherwise at high risk of contracting the virus, the group said in a news release yesterday. The advice is far more conservative than that of the U.S. CDC, which leaves the decision up to women and their doctors and points out that pregnant people have an increased risk of getting seriously ill from COVID-19. Although data about the safety of COVID-19 vaccines during pregnancy are limited, "experts believe they are unlikely to pose a specific risk for people who are pregnant," the CDC says.
The Situation in the U.S.
The U.S. had recorded more than 25.4 million coronavirus cases as of 1 a.m. E.T. today. More than 425,000 people have died. On Jan. 26, there were 142,511 new cases and 3,990 new deaths confirmed in the U.S.
Here's how the country as a whole is currently trending:
Here's where daily cases have risen or fallen over the last 14 days, shown in confirmed cases per 100,000 residents:
Walmart said in a statement today that more than 5,000 of its stores (under its mainline brand and its Sam's Club locations) are ready to administer vaccines to the community. Inoculations at the retailer will begin this week in Maryland, Texas, Delaware, Indiana and the District of Columbia. Walmart has said it will be able to administer 10-13 million doses per month, given enough supply.
Philadelphia has broken ties with a group run by college students that was selected to run the city's first and largest vaccination site, with reportedly disastrous results. The Washington Postreports that the organization, Philly Fighting COVID, morphed from a non-profit into a for-profit company shortly after being selected to run the site, and added language potentially allowing it to sell users' personal data. The group's 22-year-old CEO, meanwhile, is alleged to have stolen vaccine doses; prosecutors are investigating the claims.
All numbers unless otherwise specified are from the Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering, and are accurate as of Jan. 27, 1 a.m. E.T. To see larger, interactive versions of these maps and charts, click here.
WHAT ELSE YOU SHOULD KNOW
A Clinic in Ecuador Injected Thousands with a Fake Vaccine
Police have shut down a clinic in Quito, the capital of Ecuador, that charged thousands $15 each for a fake COVID-19 vaccine, my colleague Ciara Nugent reports. It's the latest of many alarming vaccine-related scams reported in several countries. Read more here.
Why Some People Love Wearing Masks
Not everyone considers masking up to be a sacrifice; some people see it as a huge source of relief, the BBC reports. You don't have to wear makeup with a mask or fake-smile at strangers, for one. Others like feeling protected by the anonymity masks offer. But experts point out that they're only a temporary solution to social anxiety. Read more here.
The Conspiracy Theories Scaring Women Away from Vaccination
Many young women are considering skipping their COVID-19 shots because of baseless fertility fears, write Dr. Akiko Iwasaki and Alice Lu-Culligan in the New York Times. These myths—for instance, that COVID-19 vaccines cause infertility by interfering with the development of the placenta—are spreading quickly on social media. Read more here.
Everyone Should Wear an N95 Mask Now
Almost a year into the pandemic, essential workers and ordinary Americans should have easy access to N95 masks, our best hope for slowing the spread until everyone can be vaccinated, writes Joseph Allen, an associate professor at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, in the Washington Post. Read more here.
Thanks for reading. We hope you find the Coronavirus Brief newsletter to be a helpful tool to navigate this very complex situation, and welcome feedback at coronavirus.brief@time.com. If you have specific questions you'd like us to answer, please send them to covidquestions@time.com.
If you were forwarded this and want to sign up to receive it daily, click here.
Today's newsletter was written by Mandy Oaklander and edited by Alex Fitzpatrick.
沒有留言:
張貼留言