About 19.1 million doses of coronavirus vaccine have been administered in the United States, of nearly 40 million distributed, as the new administration of Biden increases inoculation efforts.
Dr. Steven McDonald, an emergency physician in New York, described the current situation as a battle between the launch of the vaccine and the continued spread of the coronavirus among the population.
“It is difficult to say which of these forces will win more quickly,” said McDonald on Yahoo Finance Live (video above). “I would say from now on, the virus is winning. The vaccine’s launch is far behind what we need ”.
The country recently surpassed 400,000 COVID deaths earlier this week, and public health officials expect another increase in cases as a more contagious coronavirus strain becomes dominant in the United States.
For the country to achieve herd immunity, which would allow a return to normality, between 80-90% of the population needs to be vaccinated. Approximately 5% of the United States population has been inoculated so far.
The Biden government’s goal is to vaccinate 1 million Americans a day during the first 100 days of Biden’s presidency. President Biden is planning to invoke the Defense Production Act to increase vaccine production.
“Strengthening vaccine supply chains will be instrumental in fighting this,” said McDonald.
‘It’s hard to say that something is under control’
The new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Dr. Rochelle Walensky, warned that there are “dark weeks ahead” for the country and predicted that the United States will exceed the 500,000 death count in mid-February. McDonald’s echoed a similar sentiment.
“As long as the numbers in the United States remain 100,000, 200,000 people are affected every day, it’s hard to say that anything is under control,” said McDonald. “Even with the trend of things in the right direction, the magnitude of these numbers suggests that this is far beyond our control.”
He added: “I really think a vaccine is going to be the only thing that can control it because we have public health measures in place that don’t seem to be working so far.”
The spread of the coronavirus did not discriminate based on geographic location – California is facing an overwhelming number of cases, as are the Dakotas and parts of the Northeast. Several of the states that have witnessed wave peaks have had mask orders and other restrictions in place, but have not been as effective in recent months as more people gathered indoors due to the colder climate.
“In terms of preventing spread and what individuals can do, the overwhelming source of spread is what is called ‘living room spread’,” said McDonald. “This is when you have people that you assume are safe, but have actually been exposed, are infected, even though they may not be showing signs of symptoms. That’s how it really spreads. “
Public health experts attributed the increase in holiday cases mainly to internal meetings. If that trend continues, McDonald said, the United States will be forced to continue with restrictions throughout the year until the vaccine is delivered.
“Until we can somehow control this, which would mean regulating individual behavior, we really will have no control over the transmissibility of that,” said McDonald, adding: “I don’t have a crystal ball, but if the rates continue as they are , I think [we’ll be] remaining in isolation and under these public health restrictions for the rest of the year. That said, we hope to be learning from our mistakes and will have a much more effective launch in the spring. “
Adriana is a reporter and editor who covers health policy and policies for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on twitter @adrianambells.
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