Elected President Joe Biden speaks on January 14 in Wilmington, Delaware.
Photographer: Alex Wong / Getty Images
Photographer: Alex Wong / Getty Images
President Joe Biden, president, has proposed reviewing the rules for coronavirus vaccines and opening more websites to receive shots, but his plan to improve U.S. vaccinations largely retains the legs of the Trump administration’s system.
Prior to the remarks in Wilmington, Delaware, Biden’s office announced changes he would make to increase the vaccination rate. His promises are vague over timelines and reinforce Biden’s previous warnings that there will be no quick fix.
“We did not encounter it overnight. And we will not get out of it overnight either, ”said Biden. “We are staying in a very dark winter.”
Biden and his assistants have been increasingly critical of the deployment of the vaccine for the Trump administration, which so far has not met vaccination targets. But the president-elect’s plan comes down to a review of Trump’s effort, not a rewriting.
‘The explosion of the vaccine in the United States has been a sad failure so far, ‘he said. According to him, five changes will help the US reach its goal of 100 million doses in its first 100 days.
“You have my word: we will get the operation right,” he said.
As president, Biden will encourage states to abandon a complex series of priority groups used to drive out vaccinations and instead focus on shooting essential workers and everyone over the age of 65, according to an announcement from its transition office on Friday. He plans to set up community vaccination centers and mobile clinics and try to make shots available at pharmacies.
The implementation of priority groups was driven by science, but ‘was too rigid and confusing’, Biden said. “There are tens of millions of doses of vaccine that sit unused in freezers across the country, while people who want it cannot get vaccinated,” he said.
He said he would instruct the Federal Emergency Management Agency to set up, on the first day of office, community vaccination centers, in places like gyms, sports stadiums and community centers. ‘Mobile clinics moving from community to community’ will partner with local healthcare professionals to get vaccinations to ‘hard to reach’ communities, he said.
Biden’s administration will also work more closely with pharmacies to administer vaccines, although it was not clear how he would improve the partnerships they have already entered into with the government.
Biden also said he would use the Defense Production Act to increase the manufacture of vaccines and the necessities needed to administer them, such as vials and needles. The announcement contained few details.
“I have asked the team already and we have identified the suppliers who are willing to work with our teams,” he said.
His fourth change, he said, is a previously announced plan to release more first-dose vaccines and keep less in reserve for second-dose. The Trump administration has announced that it will make this change itself this week. Biden said his administration would not change the recommended dosing schedules, which should give people a booster shot up to three or four weeks after their first dose.
His fifth change, he said, would include more transparency for the vaccination program, including regular updates on the progress of vaccinating the population.
Biden’s team on Friday appointed former Food and Drug Administration commissioner David Kessler as chief scientific officer of what he calls ‘Covid Response’. They are performing under the name “Operation Warp Speed” which President Donald Trump used for the vaccination effort. Kessler replaces Moncef Slaoui, who served as chief scientist of the initiative, and Kessler will focus on administering the vaccine.
Biden is preparing to be sworn in under heavy security next week in the wake of a deadly riot on Jan. 6 at the U.S. Capitol, and against the backdrop of a raging pandemic that is the biggest crisis of his emerging presidency. The U.S. this week set records for daily coronavirus deaths – there were only 3,899 on Thursday – while new cases and current hospitalizations are moving near record levels.
Biden has promised Americans that his government will suppress the pandemic, and also warns that it will not be easy or quick.
The president-elect announced his pandemic relief plan a day earlier, proposing a $ 1.9 billion package facing hurdles in Congress. On Friday, he further outlined the vaccination plan.
Biden’s vaccination pressure for frontline workers includes teachers and employees in grocery stores, as well as health workers. He is committed to releasing the “vast majority” of vaccines rather than withholding the second doses, a change the Trump administration has already made this week. This is the risk that there are not enough doses if people have to be up for their booster shot after three or four weeks.
The Trump administration has attempted to iron out a rocky explosion of vaccines. Since coronavirus vaccines were introduced in the US, 11.9 million doses have been administered, according to Bloomberg’s vaccination. This represents only 39% of the shots fired.
The run-up is racing against the clock. The US has had more than 23 million confirmed cases and regularly picks up 250,000 new cases every day. About 389,000 Americans died while the U.S. was on the verge of 400,000 deaths through Biden’s inauguration.
In the depths of the March 2020 pandemic, Trump’s White House predicted that between 100,000 and 200,000 would die.