BETHESDA, Md. (AP) – President Joe Biden said on Thursday that the United States will have enough supplies of the COVID-19 vaccine by the end of the summer to inoculate 300 million Americans.
Biden made the announcement at the National Institutes of Health’s sprawling complex near Washington while visiting some of the nation’s top scientists on the front lines of the fight against the disease. He visited the Viral Pathogenesis Laboratory that created the COVID-19 vaccine, now manufactured by Moderna and being launched in the United States and other countries.
The United States is on track to exceed Biden’s goal of administering 100 million doses of vaccine in his first 100 days in office, with more than 26 million vaccines administered in his first three weeks.
“This is just the floor,” said Biden. “Our ultimate goal is to win COVID-19.”
Biden announced on Thursday that the United States had secured contractual commitments from Moderna and Pfizer to deliver 600 million doses of the vaccine by the end of July – more than a month ahead of schedule.
“We are now on track to have enough supplies for 300 million Americans by the end of July,” he announced.
The pace of injections may increase even more if a third coronavirus vaccine by pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson receives approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
Speaking with Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country’s leading infectious disease specialist, Biden emphasized that his administration is doing everything possible to increase the supply of vaccines and the country’s ability to deliver gun injections.
“It was quite a learning process,” said Biden.
Biden, wearing a mask, used his comments to criticize President Donald Trump, saying he inherited “no plans to vaccinate most of the country”.
“It is no secret that the vaccination program was in a much worse state than my team and I predicted,” he said.
So far, the Biden government has mobilized active troops to help erect mass vaccination sites in several states, with the aim of laying the groundwork for increasing the vaccination rate as soon as more supplies are available.
The Viral Pathogenesis Laboratory is led by Dr. Barney Graham, whose team made critical discoveries years ago that laid the foundation for the rapid development of this and other COVID-19 vaccines. Before the outbreak of the pandemic, one of Graham’s research fellows, Dr. Kizzmekia Corbett, was using these previous findings to develop a vaccine for MERS, a cousin of COVID-19.
During the tour, Biden saw the laboratory bench where the researchers sequenced the virus and developed the precursor to the Modern vaccine.
Armed with their previous research, Corbett and Graham had an advantage when Chinese scientists shared the genetic map of the new coronavirus in January 2020. They already knew how to make peak proteins, which line the surface of the new coronavirus and its relative MERS, which were stable enough to be used as a key vaccine ingredient.
Within days, NIH had sent instructions to Moderna to prepare the doses, and Corbett and his colleagues were preparing the main laboratory and testing on animals that would eventually prove they were on the right track.
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Associated Press medical writer Lauran Neergaard of Washington contributed to this report.