Leading members of Biden’s COVID response team are warning internally that the U.S. may not achieve herd immunity until Thanksgiving Day or even the beginning of winter – months after it was originally calculated – according to two highs government officials.
In an interview with CBS News this week, President Joe Biden hinted at some of these concerns, saying it would be “very difficult” to achieve collective immunity – resistance to the virus in the entire population – “long before the end of the summer” with the current daily rate of approximately 1.3 million doses of vaccine. Other senior officials working on the federal government’s COVID-19 response say they are concerned with the long-term supply of vaccines and the impact on herd immunity, and have begun exploring ways to expand US manufacturing capacity, potentially by through new partnerships with external pharmaceutical companies.
In addition to supply problems, however, leading health officials say they are increasingly concerned about the UK and South Africa’s COVID-19 variants, the likelihood of more variants coming in the coming months and the possibility of that these variants avoid vaccines. There is some evidence to suggest that the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines protect against the UK’s B117 variant, although a recent study shows that a new mutation may make vaccines less effective. The data collected by the Novavax and Johnson and Johnson clinical trials in South Africa suggest that their vaccines are less effective against the rapidly spreading variant in the country. And South Africa said recently that it was halting the launch of the AstraZeneca vaccine because evidence from clinical trials suggested that the vaccine did not work well against the variant.
Together, the recent data has alarmed health officials in the Biden government, who are now raising questions about what else can be done to not only shorten the herd’s immunity schedule – not just to return Americans to some kind of normality, but also to ensure that the country does not show another increase in hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19. Authorities have spent the past few days discussing ways to increase genome sequencing to track variants and how to spread the message that Americans need to follow public health guidelines more closely to reduce transmission as cases of B117 variants begin to increase.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, who previously estimated that about 75 percent of the U.S. population would need to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity, said in an interview that he is still “cautiously optimistic” that the country will be able to achieve this goal early on. of the fall.
“I still think this is possible,” said Fauci. “As I said before, once we get into mass vaccination when the general public starts receiving it in late spring – April, May, June … and we get over any vaccination hesitation, then we should be able to achieve it 70 or 75 percent mark. We are going in the right direction. ”Fauci underscored this prediction, highlighting the fact that he has ongoing concerns about the new variants of the COVID-19.
At a press conference on Monday, Fauci said that the modeling indicates that the B117 variant “may become dominant in late March”. “This is the worrying news,” he said. “The two things we can do are, A, make sure that we comply with public health measures … and, B, vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible.” Vaccine rates have started to improve across the country in recent days. And the Biden administration continues to announce increases in the number of doses that states are receiving each week.
Still, the director of the Centers for Disease Control, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, said on Monday that the proliferation of variants “remains a major concern and is a threat that could reverse the recent positive trends we are seeing.” As of this week, 699 variant cases have been confirmed in 34 states, with 690 of those cases being variant B117, the variant first reported in the UK, said Walensky.
“The good news is that even with B117 as a dominant variant … cases plummet when people stop having contact, when people wear masks … That’s the key. We need to give a viral enemy less chance to speak.“
– former CDC director Tom Frieden
“The virus will continue to mutate, no matter what we do. The types of mutations that we will see will change as more people are immunized. And natural immunity will continue to put evolutionary pressure on the virus. Therefore, we will see different types of mutations that can help you escape protection from the vaccine or become more transmissible, ”said Rajeev Venkayya, president of the vaccine business at Takeda Pharmaceuticals, who is not involved in the COVID response. “I think the first thing that will affect the supply [and access], is currently having more vaccines, demonstrating proof of efficacy and safety. And then, I think the story is very, very promising. “
With the threats of the new variants becoming clearer, the message between Biden employees and health experts is clear: go back to basics. Follow the public health guidelines that the CDC recommended last year – masks, social distance and limited internal contact.
“The more transmissible these strains of viruses are, the greater the limit required for collective immunity. The B117 variant … is very worrying, ”said Tom Frieden, a former director of the CDC. “The good news is that even with B117 as a dominant variant in the UK and elsewhere … cases have plummeted when people stop having contact, when people wear masks, when there are people who don’t share indoor air with people who are not from your home. That is the key. We need to give a viral enemy less chance to speak. “
Still, many cities across the country are moving in the opposite direction and are beginning to loosen restrictions. In New York and New Jersey, for example, authorities have started to allow dinners and other indoor events, such as weddings, to increase. The Iowa governor has just suspended the term of the state mask.
Walensky reacted against these new guidelines on Monday, telling reporters that it discouraged any move to loosen the masking orientation. “We still have more than 100,000 cases a day,” she said. “I think we still need to control this pandemic. We still have this emerging threat of variants. And I would simply discourage any of those activities. We really need to keep all mitigation measures at stake here if we are to really get control of this pandemic. “
Atul Gawande, a former member of President Biden’s COVID-19 transition advisory board, said in an interview that vaccination is not the only way to combat the new variants.
“We are going to need more than vaccines when it comes to strains. We have a very high rate of viral circulation. So, we will continue to generate new strains. The fact that we’ve already seen strains that have some diminished efficacy for vaccines suggests where we might be struggling, ”said Gawande. “We will have a year in which it will take a long time not just to reach people. We will have significant pockets of population that still will not have received the vaccine, either because they do not want or want or want to wait. We will have a significant circulation. Variants are increasingly defeating monoclonal antibodies ”.