FINALLY! FDA OKs VACCINE, COMING SOON
The Food and Drug Administration approved the emergency use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine Friday.
The approval clears the way for the first wave of American recipients — millions of health workers and nursing-home residents — to begin getting shots almost immediately.
“The first vaccine will be administered in less than 24 hours,” President Trump said Friday at 9:30 p.m.
The historic go-ahead hopefully marks the beginning of the end of the pandemic in the United States, where more than 294,000 people have died of COVID-19.
The vaccine, developed by the Manhattan-based Pfizer and the German company BioNTech, is designed to be given in two doses three weeks apart, and will be the first vaccine against the coronavirus distributed in the U.S.
“Today our nation has achieved a medical miracle,” Trump tweeted. “We have delivered a safe and effective vaccine in just nine months. This is one of the greatest scientific accomplishments in history.”
Ongoing trials involving 44,000 recipients indeed show the Pfizer vaccine is 95 percent effective in warding off illness, including for the elderly and people with preexisting conditions. Data also show it is safe to take.
The rollout, however, will be slow, as initial supplies are scarce and the vaccine itself needs to be stored at ultra-cold temperatures, either with dry ice or in special refrigerators.
An estimated 3 million doses are expected in the first shipments around the country.
And New York is getting an added boost of COVID-19 vaccines, with 346,000 doses of Moderna’s shot headed to the state before Christmas, Gov. Cuomo said Friday.
The governor tweeted that the Moderna vaccines, if approved by the FDA, were expected to be delivered the week of Dec. 21.
Moderna asked the FDA for emergency-use authorization of its vaccine late last month.
Trump credited Friday’s success to “Operation Warp Speed,” which he called “the greatest medical manufacturing endeavor in American history.”
The program channeled $14 billion in federal funds into the race to develop, manufacture and distribute effective vaccines.