Caroline Menna getting vaccinated (for the 2020-21 flu season)
It is a dark time in the United States. The battle against the pandemic has not gone well. Yet, there is light at the end of the pandemic tunnel. A number of successful vaccine trials have been announced in the last two weeks.
At the moment, however, the country is in the middle of the metaphorical tunnel. According to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center (JHCRC), the US accounts for one fifth of those killed by the disease (over 250,000) and the confirmed cases of infection (over 11 million) worldwide, despite accounting for just over four percent of the world population.
As winter quickly approaches, a new and dire coronavirus swell is occurring with cases of infection rising exponentially. JHCRC reports that daily cases are surging toward 200,000 - with one million new cases in just the last week. Currently, hospitalizations are over 70,000 and daily deaths near 1,500. In a statement accompanying data showing that one million children under 18 have now contracted the virus, Sally Goza, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association, said that she found that number “staggering and tragic.”
National Public Radio and other news outlets are reporting that hospitals in big cities, and small towns alike, are nearing capacity: “We have a legitimate reason to be very, very concerned about our health system at a national level,” said Lauren Sauer, an assistant professor of emergency medicine at Johns Hopkins University, who studies hospital capacity. The shutting down of all hybrid and in-person schooling in favor of remote learning for New York City’s entire public school system, the largest in the nation, occurred on November 19th.
Locally, The Wenatchee World is reporting that, as of November 18th, North Central Washington “counties have the third highest COVID-19 rate in the state.” Dr. Malcolm Butler, the chief medical officer at Columbia Valley Community Health, and the health officer at the Chelan-Douglas Health District, said on KOHO Radio that the state of the pandemic locally “is right now a disaster.” Statewide shutdowns have begun, not just in Washington, but across the nation, in an effort to stave off an even larger upsurge in deaths and ease the burden on an already stressed healthcare system.
Despite the deluge of bad news pointing to a very dangerous winter ahead, there is reason for optimism: news from vaccine makers point to a realistic possibility of bringing the pandemic to an end in the United States within a year, meaning that there exists a realistic chance of life progressing toward normal by next fall.
Connecticut based pharmaceutical giant Pfizer (in partnership with the German biotechnology company BioNTech) and the Massachusetts based biotech firm Moderna have both announced breakthroughs in vaccine development. Pfizer stated in a November 18th follow-up press release, to its initial vaccine announcement on November 9th, that its vaccine is “95% effective against COVID-19,” had no serious side effects, and that “[e]fficacy was consistent across age, gender, race and ethnicity demographics; observed efficacy in adults over 65 years of age was over 94%”. Similarly, Moderna announced via press release on November 12th that early independent testing of its vaccine candidate had an “estimate[d] efficacy of 94.5% against COVID-19".
Vaccine research to immunize against COVID-19 began less than a year ago. Fortunately, as chronicled in The New England Journal of Medicine, research scientists around the world had a significant head-start in that they could build upon vaccine work already done on related coronaviruses like Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, or MERS. Still, head-start or not, the process of bringing a vaccine to market usually takes years, if not closer to a decade. The mumps vaccine was the next fastest to be developed and licensed in just four years.
Pfizer’s chief executive, Dr. Albert Bourla, said in a statement, that if the company’s vaccine does receive, from the Food and Drug Administration, emergency approval, it could produce enough doses by the end the year to immunize 15 to 20 million people. Healthcare and other frontline workers would likely be the first to begin the two-dose vaccination regimen in late December. They would be followed by those most vulnerable to the disease, such as the elderly and those with underlying conditions, children, and eventually healthy adults, the latter possibly as early as late spring or summer of 2021.
Before rushing too quickly to celebrate though, it should be noted that the Pfizer and Moderna results were published via press release, rather than how such results are usually published in peer-reviewed medical journals, which are considered to be much more scientifically reliable. In addition, the Pfizer vaccine is required to be stored at minus 80 degrees Celsius to remain effective, which poses transportation and storage challenges. The Moderna vaccine can be stored at minus 20 degrees Celsius, which most medical offices and pharmacies’ freezers can handle. Yet, being cautiously optimistic is not unwarranted, as the calvary is on the way, so to speak. Other global pharmaceutical companies, such as AstraZeneca, Oxford, Johnson & Johnson, Sanofi and the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer, GlaxoSmithKline, also have promising vaccines in late stages of development and licensing, according to Carl Zimmer, science writer for The New York Times. Zimmer stated that the work of those other pharmaceutical firms is “really important in order to get everyone vaccinated,” as Pfizer and Moderna “will not be able to do it alone any time soon.”
Despite the daunting state of the virus across the country, and the many scientific and logistical hurdles to vaccinate enough of the population to end the pandemic, this month’s news is hopeful. After hearing about the vaccine breakthroughs, a CHS freshman, Rhetta Cummings, voiced cautious optimism: “I’m hopeful. These last months have not been easy. The vaccine news is good, especially in the longer term. However, I think it’s important that we all remain careful and responsible to protect the vulnerable until the whole population is vaccinated. That might mean not resuming in-person school until next year.” Rhetta’s sentiments concerning responsibility echo those of Dr. Butler, who reminds everyone that “80 percent of the time, COVID is transmitted through the air” and, until mass immunization, the “the most powerful mitigation techniques are masking, staying six feet apart and washing hands.”
While vigilance and responsibility are needed in the coming months, dreaming and even planning for a time after the COVID-19 pandemic, is not in vain. Life, close to how it was in 2019, could be possible in the United States by the end of 2021. Concerts, international sporting events with fans, and the like, could return by 2022. CHS Junior Lien Hagedorn, anxious to return to school, cross-country running and cross-country skiing said it well: “Even though we’ve all been dealing with the pandemic for the last eight months, this week, in mid-November, has really brought home the deadly seriousness of the disease and, at the same time, the amazing work of the scientific community. I’m looking forward to the time when this period is just a memory.”
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