U.S. hits vaccine milestone as variants spread fast
What happened
With the U.S. now administering a record 3 million Covid-19 shots a day, the Biden administration this week urged Americans to keep social distancing and wearing masks for a little while longer to prevent a variantfueled spike in coronavirus cases. At least 150 million doses have been administered since President Biden took office; nearly a third of the U.S. population has now received at least one shot, and almost 1 in 5 Americans are fully vaccinated. The fastaccelerating inoculation campaign allowed Biden to move up by two weeks, to April 19, his deadline for states to make all adults eligible for vaccines. But with new infections and hospitalizations rising among young people, Biden warned Americans against lowering their guard prematurely. “Too many people, seeing the end in sight, think we’re at the finish line already,” he said. “We aren’t.” Many Americans are returning to their pre-pandemic habits: According to an Axios/Ipsos poll, 55 percent have seen family or friends in the past week, more than at any point in a year, and 36 percent haven’t been social distancing at all recently.
About 65,000 new infections are being recorded every day in the U.S., up 18 percent in two weeks. Nearly half of those new cases are occurring in just five states—New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Michigan—where more-contagious variants are spreading fast. In hardest-hit Michigan—which is averaging more than 6,600 cases a day, up from 1,350 daily cases five weeks ago— the U.K. variant accounts for an estimated 70 percent of infections. At least one case of a “double mutant” strain believed to be driving a surge of cases in India has now been confirmed in California.
What the columnists said
Hitting 3 million shots a day is a big deal, said David Leonhardt in The New York Times. For months, health officials have been saying we need to reach that number to contain the new variants. They seem to be right, because while cases have picked up slightly, “the widely predicted spring surge has not happened—so far at least.” Crucially, deaths have dropped steadily, from more than 3,200 a day in early February to about 780 now. That’s almost certainly because 75 percent of seniors have received at least one shot.
Vaccine “demand is still outstripping supply,” said Paul Waldman in WashingtonPost.com, “but that won’t be true forever.” The next big challenge will be persuading “stragglers to take the vaccine so the pandemic can finally be behind us.” While much has been made of race and vaccine hesitancy, an equal share of Blacks and whites—about 20 percent—are reluctant to get a jab. “The starkest difference” is party identification: 35 percent of Republicans say they will refuse a shot, compared with 8 percent of Democrats.
“Kids are the key to ending this deadly pandemic,” said Dr. Charles Schleien in the New York Daily News. Herd immunity likely requires at least 70 percent of Americans to get inoculated, and it will be impossible to hit that benchmark if we fail to vaccinate children, who constitute 23 percent of the population. So as soon as the FDA authorizes Covid shots for under-16s, parents will need to roll up their kids’ sleeves. That will help protect grown-ups and youngsters. Average daily cases among children have soared by 200 percent in recent weeks, and while most of those kids will avoid serious illness, “we don’t know the long-term developmental and health impacts of Covid.”
What won’t help resolve this crisis are more pointless lockdowns, said Jacob Sullum in Reason.com. When Texas lifted its Covid-19 restrictions last month, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott was accused of “inviting a public health disaster.” But a “fourth wave” hasn’t materialized in the Lone Star State, while states such as Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Vermont that continue to restrict indoor dining and place other Covid limits on businesses have seen cases rise.
The U.S. “is entering a new phase of the pandemic,” said Alexis Madrigal in TheAtlantic.com. Previous surges have been described as “waves,” yet a better metaphor for what’s ahead is “a tornado.” Some communities “won’t see the storm, others will be well fortified against disaster, and the most at-risk places will be crushed.” For the vaccinated, “this disease is essentially harmless.” Washington state, for example, has reported only 100 cases and eight hospitalizations among its 1.2 million vaccinated residents. But for the unvaccinated, Covid-19 remains “as devastating as it has always been.”