Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Stephen Hahn said Sunday he would not make a prediction about when a coronavirus vaccine would be available after President Trump
Donald John Trump protesters tear down the Christopher Columbus statue on Baltimore Independence Day star Bill Pullman, urging Americans to wear a “mask of freedom” on July 4. He stated that a vaccine or therapy would be ready “long before the end of the year.”
In a July 4 speech in Washington, DC, on Saturday, Trump said the United States was unleashing its “scientific brilliance” to develop treatments for COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.
“And we will likely have a therapeutic and / or vaccine solution well before the end of the year,” Trump said.
When asked about Sunday’s comments on ABC’s “This Week,” Hahn said the FDA is currently monitoring 141 clinical trials of possible COVID-19 therapeutic treatments. However, he said he was not in a position to pass judgment on the timelines for a vaccine.
“I can’t predict when a vaccine will be available,” he said, noting that the agency issued guidance on the development process last week.
NEW: FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn does not endorse Pres. Trump’s timeline suggesting a COVID-19 vaccine could be available “well before the end of the year”, telling @MarthaRaddatz: “I can’t predict when will a vaccine be available. ” Https://t.co/7UJnu9cnQl photo. twitter.com/dUTXeEoBCO
– ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) July 5, 2020
“Our solemn promise to the American people is that we will make a data and science-based decision about a vaccine regarding the safety and efficacy of that vaccine,” he added. “When that data is available, and I hope that data is available sooner rather than later, we will make that judgment based on that data and that science.”
The World Health Organization (WHO) said in April that clinical trials had started for three vaccines, with more than 70 in development.
Top health officials have said a vaccine may be ready for use in January. But they have also expressed caution over the timeline, noting the importance of ensuring that a vaccine is effective first.
Anthony Fauci
Anthony FauciTrump beats the ‘radical left’, the media, China in the direction of Independence Day, the White House seeks to make ‘we need to live with it’ the new tone on the coronavirus: report that the Rand exchange Paul with Fauci was exactly what America needed MORE, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert and key member of the White House coronavirus task force, told The Hill in May, “Every time you develop a vaccine, you always remember, you always have a question that it is possible that don’t get an effective vaccine. ” “
“Even if you do everything right and do everything on time, there is no guarantee that you will have an effective vaccine. So when we talk about having a vaccine that could be available in December or January, the vaccine is supposed to be really effective.” , said.
Speaking in an interview for the Aspen Ideas Festival last week, Fauci said he would settle for a vaccine that was 70 to 75 percent effective. But she noted that the United States was unlikely to be able to fight the outbreak if about 30 percent of the population refused to take one. Recent survey results indicate that substantial portions of the population hesitate to receive a vaccine.
Trump previously predicted that a vaccine would be ready by the end of the year. The prediction was timed with news that the administration was pressuring agencies to speed up the vaccine development process with a project called “Operation Warp Speed.”
“I think we are going to have a vaccine much sooner than later,” he said at the time.
As of Sunday, the US had reported more than 2.8 million confirmed cases of the coronavirus and approximately 129,000 deaths caused by it. The country reported 54,500 cases of the virus on Thursday alone, according to a Johns Hopkins University database, which represents a new one-day high.
During his comments in Washington, Trump touted the United States’ ability to test, claiming that it shows that 99 percent of cases are “totally harmless.”
When asked for evidence of the claim, Hahn said Sunday that “this is a very fast-moving pandemic” and that “any death, any case is tragic, and we want to do everything possible to avoid it.” He added that the United States would halt the upward trend in cases as long as people followed health protocols, including wearing face masks in public and enforcing social distancing restrictions.
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