- Dr. Anthony Fauci believes an effective coronavirus vaccine will be granted approval by late 2020.
- Fauci recently said that we could have tens of millions of COVID-19 vaccine doses ready to go by early 2021. Fauci added that 1 billion doses might be available before 2022.
- To date, the U.S. has seen more than 4.7 million coronavirus cases and more than 159,000 deaths.
A number of homeowners in the Los Angeles area recently came under fire for throwing wild summer parties over the past few weeks, a fact which is all the more alarming given that the coronavirus is rising rapidly all across California. In fact, the problem of large gatherings became so pronounced that Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti this week said the city will cut off water to homeowners who host large parties.
“While we have already closed all bars and nightclubs,” Garcetti said, “these large house parties have essentially become nightclubs. You’re breaking the law. Just as we can shut down bars breaking alcohol laws in places that are in criminal violations, we can shut [houses] down.”
The development above essentially highlights the inability of Americans to adhere to even simple coronavirus safety guidelines like social distancing and mask-wearing. As a result, it’s become clear in recent weeks that the only way we can realistically beat the coronavirus is with a vaccine. The resulting two-part question is thus quite simple: When can we expect a vaccine to arrive and how fast can it be administered to the public at large?
The good news is that early clinical trials of potential coronavirus vaccine candidates have been encouraging. Just yesterday we reported that a vaccine candidate from Novavax yielded promising results from its Phase 1 trial. Meanwhile, Moderna is anticipating that enrollment in its Phase 3 trial for its own coronavirus vaccine candidate should wrap up sometime next month.
All that said, Dr. Anthony Fauci during a recent interview remained optimistic that a coronavirus vaccine will be granted approval before the end of 2020.
Once approved, Fauci believes we might have 1 billion doses ready to go by the end of 2021, and hopefully tens of millions of doses ready earlier in the year.
Those goals are only possible because drugmakers have agreed to manufacture large supplies of their vaccines even before they know whether they work in order to save time.
“The federal government has put more than one egg in the basket,” Fauci said. “We have a pretty comprehensive portfolio that’s going to subsequently be going into clinical trials.”
As it stands now, the CDC this week revealed that the United States has thus far seen 4.7 million coronavirus cases and more than 159,000 coronavirus-related deaths. The states that have been hit hardest by COVID-19 include California, Florida, Texas, New York, and Georgia.
