The new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday that the Covid-19 vaccine would not be widely available in late February, as the Trump administration said earlier.
The new administration is determined to meet the goal of 100 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccine in 100 days, Dr. Rochelle Walensky told Savannah Guthrie on NBC’s “TODAY” program.
However, injections will not be available to anyone in pharmacies, such as the flu vaccine, at the end of February, as former Secretary of Health and Human Services, Alex Azar, told Guthrie last month.
“We will, as part of our plan, put the vaccine in pharmacies. Will it be in all pharmacies in this country in that timeline? I don’t think so,” said Walensky. “I don’t think that at the end of February we will have a vaccine in all pharmacies in this country.”
“After 100 days, there are still a lot of Americans who need the vaccine, so we have our metal pedal to make sure we can get the maximum vaccine out there,” she said. “We recognize that this is the most immediate emergency to bring this country back to health.”
According to Walensky, the work to meet the 100-day goal “had already begun” and the main points of the plan are to ensure that the vaccine’s eligibility meets the supply, that there are enough vaccinators and that the vaccine sites are “diverse so we can reach all people. “
“The whole basis for implementing the vaccine must be based on equity and we are committed to that,” she said.
A main objective is to help people who have “hesitation about the vaccine” by educating them about science so that they understand the vaccine better, according to Walensky.
Management also needs to locate and correct distribution problems, ensuring that the vaccine, syringes and demand for injections are aligned in specific locations, she said.
“We have been meeting daily for at least six weeks or more. So this work has already started, so we are on site,” said Walensky. “The plan was not to start planning sycophants. The plan is to start working today and take it to the people.”
Walensky, an infectious disease specialist at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, took an oath on Wednesday when the U.S. reported 4,131 coronavirus-related deaths, setting a record for the highest number of COVID-19 deaths recorded in a single day.
Walensky said that at the current rate, 100,000 coronavirus-related deaths can be expected by mid or late February.
