- Moncef Slaoui, head of the White House’s Operation Warpspeed, said the new coronavirus variant “should be under control” with the vaccines.
- “This virus actually mutates as part of its normal behavior, and therefore it is normal to expect that there will be variants,” Slaoui said in an interview about CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday.
- Vaccination companies and health experts have said that the vaccines against coronavirus should work to protect against the new variant which is thought to be up to 70% more transmissible.
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Moncef Slaoui, head of the White House’s Operation Warpspeed, said the new coronavirus variant “should be under control” with the vaccines.
“This virus actually mutates as part of its normal behavior, and therefore it is normal to expect that there will be variants,” Slaoui said in an interview about CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday. “Based on the information shared with us by the British scientists and early data we have here, we think this virus variant should be under this vaccine.”
At the end of December, a new coronavirus variant, which is thought to be up to 70% more transmissible, was reported. Since then, parts of the UK have imposed strict restrictions, and many countries around the world have restricted travel from the country.
—Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) January 3, 2021
At least 33 countries have detected cases of the new variant, and the U.S. reported cases of the new variant in San Diego and Colorado last week.
Vaccination companies and health experts said the coronavirus vaccines, which were distributed across the country last month, should work to protect the new variant. The CEO of BioNTech said there was a ‘relatively high’ chance that the vaccine would work with Pfizer of the company, and the CEO of AstraZeneca said that their vaccine “should remain effective.” As Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce of Business Insider reported, experts have doubled that this vaccine is likely to work against the new strains of the virus.