President Trump said the United States wouldn’t have a vaccine for five years if not for his presidency.
“If I wasn’t president, according to almost everybody, even the enemy, if I wasn’t president, you wouldn’t have a vaccine for five years,” Trump told Fox News’s Brian Kilmeade in an interview at West Point. “I push the FDA and companies, and everybody else involved like nobody’s ever been pushed before.”
“They call it a medical miracle, and it’s going to have a tremendous impact,” Trump said.
The Food and Drug Administration granted an emergency use authorization for Pfizer and BioNTech’s two-stage coronavirus vaccine on Friday. During a Saturday press conference, Gen. Gustave Perna, the chief operating officer for the Department of Defense’s Operation Warp Speed, said 145 sites across the country will receive the newly authorized vaccine on Monday.
The U.S. government has secured 100 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine, enough to inoculate 50 million of the country’s most vulnerable people. Healthcare workers and long-term care facility residents and staff will be the first to receive the inoculation, followed by essential workers, such as police, grocery store employees, and teachers and school staff.
“And now, you have it rolling out,” Trump said. “And frankly, they could have done it a week sooner.”
Trump has frequently complained about the pace the FDA took during its review of Pfizer’s request leading up to the Friday authorization, particularly after the vaccine was approved in the United Kingdom and Canada.
Even after the FDA authorized the vaccine for emergency use, Trump tweeted that the FDA’s Dr. Stephen Hahn needed to “stop playing games” and accelerate the vaccine rollout process.
“While my pushing the money drenched but heavily bureaucratic @US_FDA saved five years in the approval of NUMEROUS great new vaccines, it is still a big, old, slow turtle,” Trump tweeted. “Get the dam vaccines out NOW, Dr. Han @SteveFDA. Stop playing games and start saving lives!!!”
While my pushing the money drenched but heavily bureaucratic @US_FDA saved five years in the approval of NUMEROUS great new vaccines, it is still a big, old, slow turtle. Get the dam vaccines out NOW, Dr. Hahn @SteveFDA. Stop playing games and start saving lives!!!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 11, 2020
The FDA is scheduled to hold a hearing on Moderna’s coronavirus vaccine on Thursday. It could be the next vaccine to be approved in the U.S. as early as Friday.
