Dr. Moncef Slaoui, the Trump administration's vaccine czar, gave positive insight on a potential reduction in COVID-19 related deaths that could come within the first few months of vaccine distribution.
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On Sunday, Slaoui told CNN's Jake Tapper that he expects the elderly population in long-term care facilities to become vaccinated within the next month, prompting a sharp decline in deaths. Roughly 40%-50% of the current death toll comes from that population, he said.
"We should be able to have immunized that full population and the health care workers that take care of them by the end of the month of December or by the middle of the month of January. The vaccine efficacy, as we have seen it, actually starts reasonably quickly after the first dose of vaccine and is further maintained with the second dose," Slaoui said. "Therefore, I’m hopeful that by the end of the month of January, we should already see quite a significant decrease in the mortality and severe morbidity associated in the elderly population."
The first doses of COVID-19 vaccines are recommended to go to healthcare workers and long-term care residents, who are considered highly vulnerable to the effects of COVID-19.
This week, a panel made up of top medical experts are expected to help the Food and Drug Administration review a vaccine candidate by Pfizer found to be 95% effective in preventing the virus. Slaoui said he expects the review to go smoothly and that the first doses could be distributed shortly afterward this week.
Since its outbreak earlier this year, the virus has killed more than 280,000 people in the United States and infected more than 14 million.
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