Which country produces the first workable vaccine will get “soft power” on the global stage. In the race to be first, China is giving an experimental vaccine to its military. Russian President Putin recently announced that a vaccine was ready for widespread use.
And President Trump says he is ‘optimistic’ that a fax round of election day will be ready.
But experts warn against a dangerous rush to get to the end of the vaccine first, saying short cuts in vaccine safety and effectiveness tests endanger millions of lives in the short term, and public confidence in the vaccines and a long time will come to damage.
In interviews sponsored by the National Press Foundation, fax authorities answered questions about the US strategy.
F: Who is employed in the US? What are our plans?
IN: Currently, distribution is coordinated through “Operation Warp Speed” – specifically the US Department of Defense.
‘They’ve been pretty quiet about how they plan this … Warp Speed is a’ black box ‘in many ways … It’s kind of the Department of Defense’s ethos, and they say so you just do not much.
I just wish this was a little more transparent of a process … But they’re scared of this kind of security issue; cyber attack as physical attack, they talk a lot about it ..
It would actually be nice for them to lay out their plan now so we can coordinate with states and locations and districts on how we can get it out, because it will be a tour de force to do so. It is much harder than just delivering masks, PPE, contact tracing or testing. This will be the hardest of all. ”
- Dr. Paul A. Offit, Head of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Philadelphia Children’s Hospital and co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine
Q: Will a fax be ready by election day?
IN: “There are concerns among some of us – in fact some of us who are close by here – of what we would call ‘the October surprise’.
I mean, the thing with Operation Warp Speed is that there are now tens of millions of doses being produced from various faxes. That’s a big and attractive pool of faxes in which the administration could dip its hands.
I think it is highly unlikely that we would have clear evidence of phase three research on effectiveness at the end of October, beginning of November. Nevertheless, President Trump has said that he fully expects us to have a fax by Election Day.
I do not see how that is possible, except what happens is that the administration dips its hand into Warp Speed, pulls out a few faxes and says, ‘Look, we have these tests on thousands of people. It seems to be safe. The immune responses are great. I think people are dying, and we need to get this vaccine out. ‘
I think that would be a mistake. You want to make sure we have clear data on effectiveness before we release this vaccine, because there is a fragile fax confidence in this country.
You only get one chance to make the first impression. These faxes are critical. I think between vaccines, population immunity and hygiene, that’s our way out of here. We can not shake confidence in faxes. ”
- Dr. Paul A. Offit, Head of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine.
F: Would there be a shortage of supplies?
IN: “Syringes are probably less of a problem. But bottles and stoppers … If I wanted to pay attention to what could go wrong, it would be me. ”
- Dr. Georges Benjamin, Executive Director of the American Public Health Association
Q: What percentage of Americans should be vaccinated to combat COVID-19?
IN: It depends on two things: Infection and the effectiveness of the vaccine.
Let us assume, as many experts do, that the transmission period is two – that is, each sick person infects two people. Let us also assume that a vaccine is 75% effective. (The FDA says they will accept 50% effectiveness.)
You would need to vaccinate about two-thirds of the U.S. population to stop the spread.
- Dr. Paul A. Offit, Head of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine.
F: How many doses are needed?
A: If we vaccinate one third of Americans, that’s 122 million people. If we use a two-dose vaccine, that’s 240 million people. That’s a lot what then – especially a complex biological product. It is also a logistically daunting goal.
‘And you have to get that out. So, you need to be able to distribute the vaccine on sites that are much more than just the doctor’s office and the pharmacy. You will have a lot of care points for that kind of loading faxes to get it efficiently, to the right people, and make sure they get a booster dose a month later. “
- Dr. Paul A. Offit, Head of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine.
F: Do you expect problems?
IN: “If a vaccine is actually administered at the scale of millions – that this vaccine, and all vaccinated routine recommendations – are going to be unusual events. (But) there are systems in place now to address this. to actually detect rare adverse events. “
- Dr. Julie Morita, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, former director of the Chicago Department of Public Health
F: Right now, which vaccine looks best?
IN: ‘I want to come down firmly on’ hitting me ‘. I’m not making any more speculations about this. We’ll see what the data looks like.
We are all in phase one. We do not really know. It tries to read the tea leaves. I’m open to one of these approaches as many of those approaches that work … I don ‘t put my money to nothing. ‘
- Dr. Paul A. Offit, Head of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine.
F: Will there be more than one vaccine? What if they all work?
IN: “We need more, more winners here. We need faxes for seven billion people on this planet. Not one manufacturer will be able to scale and make sufficient doses.
I hope they all work. And then we find over time what works better in certain situations, but let’s just hope there are a lot of winners here. ”
- Dr Leonard Friedland, Director of Scientific Affairs and Public Health, Faxes, GSK
