Health care workers and nursing home residents will be the first
in the United States to get Covid-19 vaccines, a high-powered government panel
announced
Health care
workers and nursing home residents will be the first in the United States to
get Covid-19
vaccines, a high-powered government panel announced late Tuesday.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) panel voted 13-1 to
recommend these two groups get priority while doses are in short supply in the
early weeks.
Burden of disease
figured prominently in the decision to bring nursing home residents into the
ambit early. CDC experts noted that 40 percent of the deaths in the US have
been among those in long term care facilities.
The Food and Drug
Administration has not yet authorised emergency use of either the Pfizer or
Moderna vaccines. That decision is likely to be taken between December 10-17.
Both vaccines have shown more than 90 percent effectiveness in large scale
studies.
The first
shipments of Pfizer's
vaccine are set to be delivered to states within two weeks, CNN reported
today, quoting documents sourced from Operation Warp Speed - the Trump
government's vaccine coordination program.
Health care
workers and residents of long-term care facilities account for a little less
than 25 million people out of America's total population of 330 million.
Between Pfizer and
Moderna, a total of 40 million doses of the vaccine are expected to be
available by the end of 2020.
The coronavirus
has killed more than 270,000 Americans and sickened more than 13 million since
it first entered the country early this year.
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