Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
First Vaccine Dispatch Of 6.4M Doses To Be Sent To States As Soon As FDA OKs
NPR: Initial Batch Of COVID-19 Vaccines Will Go To States Based On Population, Not Risk
Top officials from Operation Warp Speed, the government's program to fast-track the development and delivery of COVID-19 vaccines, announced they've allocated 6.4 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to states based on their total populations. Once a COVID-19 vaccine is authorized by the Food and Drug Administration, allocations will be made based on the total number of adults in the state. "We wanted to keep this simple," Alex Azar, Secretary of Health and Human Services said at a media briefing Tuesday, "We thought it would be the fairest approach, and the most consistent." (Huang, 11/24)
The Washington Post: First Batch Of 6.4 Million Vaccine Doses Could Go Out In Mid-December
The federal government plans to send 6.4 million doses of pharmaceutical giant Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine to communities across the United States within 24 hours of regulatory clearance, with the expectation that shots will be administered quickly to front-line health-care workers, the top priority group, officials said Tuesday. Gen. Gustave Perna, who oversees logistics for Operation Warp Speed, the Trump administration’s effort to speed up treatments and vaccines, told reporters that state officials were informed on Friday night of the allocation, which is based on each state’s overall population. (Sun, 11/24)
Reuters: U.S. Officials Plan To Release 6.4 Million COVID-19 Vaccine Doses In First Distribution
U.S. officials said on Tuesday they plan to release 6.4 million COVID-19 vaccine doses nationwide in an initial distribution after the first one is cleared by regulators for emergency use. Officials from the government’s Operation Warp Speed program told reporters that states and other jurisdictions had been informed on Friday of their estimated vaccine allocations in the first shipments so they can begin planning for how to best distribute it to their high-risk populations. (Spalding and O'Donnell, 11/24)
Fox News: Redfield Projects COVID-19 Vaccine To Be Rolled Out By 'End Of The Second Week In December'
A coronavirus vaccine will begin to become available in the United States "probably by the end of the second week in December," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Robert Redfield told Fox News Tuesday. Redfield told "The Daily Briefing" that a vaccine would initially be made available "in a hierarchical way" with priority going to "nursing home residents and then some combination of health care providers and individuals at high risk for a poor outcome." (Chamberlain, 11/24)
In related news —
The Hill: CDC Advisory Panel Says People Must Be Warned About Vaccine Side Effects
Members of an advisory committee to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Monday patients need to be warned about the potential side effects of getting a COVID-19 vaccine so they are not discouraged from getting a second dose. "As a practicing physician, I have got to be sure my patients will come back for the second dose. We really have got to make patients aware that this is not going to be a walk in the park," Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, a physician representing the American Medical Association, told the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices in a meeting Monday. (Hellmann, 11/24)
