Vaccines:
Pence gets a shot; approval nears for Moderna candidate.
Vice President Mike Pence became the highest-ranking U.S. official to receive the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine on Friday in a live-television event aimed at reassuring Americans the shot is safe. He celebrated the milestone as “a medical miracle” that could eventually contain the raging pandemic.
Pence has taken an increasingly visible role in highlighting the safety and efficacy of the shots, including touring a vaccine production facility this week. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell also received COVID-19 vaccinations Friday.
President-elect Joe Biden and his wife will be getting the vaccine Monday, while Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and her husband are set to receive it the week after next.
“I didn’t feel a thing. Well done,” Pence told the technicians from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center who administered his Pfizer-biontech shot early Friday morning.
Pence didn’t flinch during the quick prick, nor did his wife, Karen, or Surgeon General Jerome Adams, who also received shots during the televised White House event in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.
“Hope is on the way,” Pence later said. “The American people can be confident: We have one and, perhaps within hours, two safe vaccines,” he added, referring to the FDA’S expected authorization of a second vaccine by Moderna.
Adams, who is Black, emphasized “the importance of representation” in outreach to at-risk communities and encouraged Americans to avoid disinformation around the vaccines.
The Food and Drug Administration was evaluating a shot developed by Moderna Inc. and the National Institutes of Health and was expected to give it the green light soon, clearing the way for its use to begin as early as Monday.
That would give the U.S. a critical new weapon against the coronavirus in addition to the Pfizer-biontech vaccine now being dispensed to millions of health care workers and nursing home patients as part of the biggest vaccination drive in American history.
The go-ahead from the FDA would mark the world’s first authorization of Moderna’s shots. Large but unfinished
studies show that both vaccines appear safe and strongly protective, though Moderna’s is easier to handle, since it does not need to be kept at ultra-frozen temperatures like the Pfizer-biontech shot. Both require two doses for full protection.
A second vaccine presents a ray of hope as the virus continues to spread.
The World Health Organization program to help get COVID-19 vaccines to all countries in need has access to nearly 2 billion doses of “promising” vaccine candidates, officials said Friday.
The initiative WHO is co-leading, known as COVAX, also has yet to receive firm pledges and a timeline from rich countries to share the vaccines they have already secured for themselves.