President Trump claimed on Wednesday that his administration was ready to distribute 100 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine by the end of the year, slapping down as he did so one of his top government health officials, who said it would not be generally available until the middle of 2021.
Trump has let it be known that he hopes a vaccine can be approved before the Nov. 3 election, which has become largely a referendum on a crisis that has killed almost 200,000 people in the United States.
“As soon as the FDA approves the vaccine, and as you know, we’re very close to that, we’ll be able to distribute 100 million doses by the end of 2020 and a large number much sooner than that,” he told reporters at the White House, saying logistics would be in place by October to begin distribution.
But the approval of a vaccine is becoming an increasingly political issue, with Democratic nominee Joe Biden warning that the president could not be trusted.
Scientists and doctors around the world are in the third phase of clinical trials and are optimistic they will have a working vaccine in record time.
The federal government published its plan on Wednesday for rolling out access. However, experts caution that it could take months after approval for vaccines to become widely available.
Hours before Trump spoke, Dr Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told Congress he believed a COVID-19 vaccine could be rolled out by the middle of next year.
Trump said the official had made a mistake. “That’s incorrect information,” he said. “I believe he was confused. I think he just misunderstood the question, probably.”
Yet Redfield’s comments are consistent with those of the country’s most senior infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who, this week, told Detroit television station WDIV it would take months for a vaccine to be available in sufficient quantities to have a meaningful impact.
At the same time, Trump faces questions about whether he is pressuring regulators to hurry through approval amid growing public skepticism about a vaccine and concerns his administration is sidelining scientists.
On Wednesday, Biden addressed the controversy and said he would prepare to be vaccinated so long as it was properly approved.
“I trust vaccines, I trust the scientists, but I don’t trust Donald Trump,” he said.
During his evening briefing, Trump dismissed the concerns, accusing his opponents of being driven by political considerations.
“This story is very simple,” he said. “They started knocking the vaccine as soon as they heard that this actually may come out prior to election. Now, it may or may not, but it will be within a matter of weeks … It’s ready to go.”
Trump was joined in the briefing by Dr. Scott Atlas, a radiologist-turned-coronavirus adviser to the White House.
He said the plan included logistics and IT systems that would mean vaccinations could be given within 24 hours of FDA approval.
“It is anticipated that no later than January, all the top priority people will have received the vaccine or be able to receive the vaccine,” he said, later adding that he anticipated a total of 700 million doses being ready by the end of the first quarter of 2021.
