On Thursday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, delivered hopeful news about the availability of the vaccine and the delay in launching the country. On NBC’s “Today” program, echoing comments from earlier in the day, Fauci said there could be a “hunting season” for the vaccine doses available in April.
“When we get to April, this will be what I would call, for better writing, ‘hunting season’, that is, practically everyone and anyone in any category could start getting vaccinated,” said Fauci. “From then on, it would probably take several more months just logistically to put the vaccine in people’s arms, so that, hopefully, by the middle and the end of the summer, we could have achieved the goal of what we are talking about – namely the overwhelming majority of people in this country having been vaccinated. “
The news coincides with the Biden government’s announcement that it purchased an additional 200 million doses of the two coronavirus vaccines, increasing supplies by 50 percent to a total of 600 million doses. Securing these additional vaccines means that, by the end of July, all those eligible for inoculation will be covered. As previously reported by the New York Times, the Trump administration rejected an offer to buy Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine beyond the 100 million starting doses. President Joe Biden previously said that the lack of vaccines was partly to blame for the slow rollout of vaccines in America.
On Thursday, Fauci said that Americans can expect vaccines to “increase” very soon. Currently, eligibility for COVID-19 varies by state and county, prioritizing frontline workers and people over 65 who are considered to be at a higher risk of developing serious illnesses.
“If you look at what will happen when we enter March and April, the number of doses available will allow for a much broader approach to mass vaccination, which is actually much more accelerated than what you are seeing now,” said Fauci. “If you compare it now to what we were literally doing just a month ago, the climb was really considerable.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 46.3 million doses were administered; 34.7 million Americans received the first dose and almost 11.2 million people received both doses. The population of the United States is about 331 million; experts believe that 80 to 90% of the population must be vaccinated, or immune to the coronavirus due to previous infection, in order for collective immunity to be achieved.
Notably, there is no estimated deadline for when children under 16 can receive the COVID-19 vaccine. The Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine is authorized for young people aged 16 to 17, as well as for adults. The Modern vaccine was authorized for people aged 18 and over and is currently conducting clinical tests on young people aged 12 to 17 years.
In an interview with Propublica, Fauci said he was hopeful that children would be able to receive the coronavirus vaccine by September 2021.
“We are in the process of starting clinical trials in what we call age reduction, where you do a clinical trial with people aged 16 to 12, after 12 to 9, after 9 to 6,” said Fauci. “I think that when we get to the school opening, we will probably be able to get people to enter the first grade.”