The development of coronavirus in Europe is probably no longer an indication of what will happen weeks later in the United States, in part due to America’s progress in vaccinating its population, Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Monday.
The comments of the former Food and Drug Administration commissioner on “Squawk Box” came a day after White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said the situation in Europe shows why US states should not completely abandon pandemic precautions now.
Italy is imposing stricter restrictions on business in certain parts of the country after an increase in the number of new infections, including an imminent national blockade for the Easter weekend. Health officials in Germany have also warned of an increase in Covid’s cases.
“Previously, I said we were four to six weeks behind Europe, and we practically were,” said Gottlieb, referring to earlier phases of the global health crisis. “Everything that happened in Europe ended up happening here. Now I think the situation has changed. We are ahead of Europe.”
“I don’t think that conditions in Europe and the situation in Europe are necessarily predictive of what will happen here, because we have a lot more immunity in our population, both from previous infection – which they also have – but also now from vaccination,” added Gottlieb , board member of Pfizer, which makes a vaccine for Covid.
About 9.5% of the vaccine-eligible population in all member states of the EU and the European Economic Area has already received at least one Covid vaccine, according to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control. Approximately 7.5% of Italians aged 18 or older and 8.5% of Germans aged 18 or older received at least one dose of the Covid vaccine, according to ECDC data.
In contrast, 27% of the adult American population received at least one injection of Covid, according to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna require two doses for total immunity protection. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which requires only a single injection, was recently released for use by the European Union. US regulators granted emergency use authorization for the J&J vaccine at the end of last month, after releasing Pfizer and Moderna in December.
“I think we should be concerned that things may change in a direction we are not anticipating,” acknowledged Gottlieb, who has already asked states to continue to demand that people wear face masks to prevent the transmission of the coronavirus. In fact, he said that ending the masks’ mandates should be the last public health measure to be suspended.
However, the former FDA chief in the Trump administration said that emerging strains of Covid, such as variant B.1.1.7 first discovered in the United Kingdom, proved less problematic in the United States than in other parts of the world.
“At the moment, you are seeing B.1.1.7 becoming quite prevalent in the United States. It is more than 50% of the cases in Texas, Florida and southern California, and you are not seeing the huge increase in cases that we may have expected. once the claimed variant remains in the United States, “said Gottlieb, attributing it to the previous level of infection in the country, along with vaccination rates.
Last week, he estimated on CNBC that about 50% of Americans have “some form of immunity” to the coronavirus.
“The fact that we have not seen the increase in coronavirus gain … even though B.1.1.7 has become the prevalent strain in the United States, I think it bodes well,” said Gottlieb on Monday.
New York, where researchers discovered a new strain called B.1.526, is a worrying area for Gottlieb. He said there are indications that certain mutations of the virus in this strain “may make it more resistant to our vaccines and increase the likelihood that people will be reinfected”.
“We really don’t understand this mutation well, but it’s a cause for concern, so we need to keep a close eye on it,” he said, adding that the next few weeks should give authorities more answers.
Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and board member of Pfizer, Tempus genetic testing start-up, health technology company Aetion and biotechnology company Illumina. He also serves as co-chairman of the “Healthy Sail Panel” for Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings and Royal Caribbean.
Clarification: This story has been updated to clarify the groups that receive the vaccines.