“It seems to be very efficient to be transmitted from person to person,” Chris Cuomo, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN, adding that recent studies show it can be more deadly. and cause more serious illnesses.
The UK variant is already on track to become dominant in hot spots like Florida and Southern California “in a few weeks,” according to a testing company called Helix, which has helped identify the largest proportion of cases in the U.S. United States.
The only way to prevent variants from becoming dominant is to prevent them from spreading from person to person by following public health measures and vaccinating as many people as possible, Fauci said.
Fauci tweeted Thursday about his hopes that the data would support coronavirus vaccination for older children in late spring or early summer.
And the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Thursday it plans to use the process to update flu vaccines as a template to authorize any changes to coronavirus vaccines to address the emergence of new variants.
“We have the ability and the ability to try to prevent them from being dominant,” Fauci said.
The new vaccines are expected to ease the burden if approved
The speed with which variants spread compared to the rate of vaccinations will be a key factor in the number of coronavirus deaths in the coming months, according to the latest forecasts from the University’s Institute of Health Metrics and Assessment. of Washington.
New coronavirus vaccines added to the market could help speed up the inoculation process.
Biotech company Novavax announced Thursday that the “ongoing review” process for the authorization of the Covid-19 vaccine is underway in several countries.
The vaccine manufacturer announced that it has begun the process with several regulatory agencies, including the U.S. FDA, the European Medicines Agency, the United Kingdom Medicines and Health Products Regulatory Agency, and Health Canada. Ongoing review means that the company will submit some complete sections of your authorization application instead of waiting until the entire application is completed.
And Johnson & Johnson officially asked the FDA for an emergency use authorization for its Covid-19 vaccine Thursday.
The company has been developing a unique vaccine that it says could help reduce “the burden of the disease on people around the world and end the pandemic,” Dr. Paul Stoffels, scientific director of Johnson & Johnson, in a statement.
The FDA will schedule a public meeting, and if the agency decides to authorize the vaccine, the CDC’s Vaccination Practice Committee will meet to discuss whether the vaccine should be given to Americans and, if so, who should be vaccinated. should acquire first.
The drive to vaccinate teachers and get them back to the classroom
As some students approach almost a year since they stepped on their classrooms, officials have been eager to return to face-to-face learning.
CDC principal Rochelle Walensky has said that with proper distancing, masking and testing, schools can safely resume on campus even before teachers are vaccinated. But many states make teacher inoculation a priority.
So far, 24 states and Washington, DC, now allow some teachers or school staff to receive the vaccine.
In West Virginia, all teachers over the age of 50 who expressed that they wanted the vaccine already received it, according to Gov. Jim Justice. In Ohio, Gov. Mike DeWine has established a plan to vaccinate all teachers by the end of February, with the goal of having all students return to classrooms by March 1st.
Alabama and Colorado will include teachers who can be vaccinated starting Monday.
But dose availability still poses a problem in many states, as officials have complained that their dose allocation does not meet demand.
In some cities, such as Chicago and Minneapolis, officials disagree with teachers ’unions and schools, as their commitment to reopening lies with concern for the safety of staff, students and families. In some cases, tensions have turned into demands and threats of strikes.
Fauci promotes two doses of vaccine for those previously infected
Separately, Fauci said Thursday that even those who have already had Covid-19 should still be vaccinated.
“If you have had Covid-19, you should get vaccinated. Because re-infection is rare 90 days after the initial infection, you can delay vaccination until the end of that 90-day period, if you wish. But vaccination remains safe after your infection. I have recovered from Covid-19, “he said in a tweet.
Although a study earlier in the week suggested that people who were previously infected with coronavirus might only need a Covid-19 vaccine, Fauci backed down.
The authors of this prepress study, which has not been peer-reviewed, argued that changing the policy to give these people a single dose “would save them unnecessary pain and release many doses of vaccine they urgently need.”
A previous infection may help start the vaccination, Fauci tweeted, but there is still not enough evidence to show that it is enough to compare it to two doses for most people.
“People who had COVID-19 should follow the current @FDA guidelines,” he said.
Michael Nedelman, Maggie Fox, Andrea Diaz, Jacqueline Howard, Yon Pomrenze, Evan Simko-Bednarski, Elizabeth Stuart, and Naomi Thomas contributed to this report.