December 2 coronavirus news

About 100 million Americans could be vaccinated against coronavirus by February, Moncef Slaoui, chief adviser to Operation Warp Speed, said Wednesday.

“All the investments we have made in scaling up and starting to stockpile manufacturing of the vaccines allow us to stay confident that we will be able to distribute 20 million vaccines, enough to vaccinate 20 million people in the US in December,” Slaoui told a news briefing.

The United States has said if both Pfizer and Moderna win US Food and Drug Administration emergency use authorization in December, they could distribute 40 million doses of vaccine by the end of the month. Each vaccine requires two doses, so that’s enough to fully vaccinate 20 million people.

An FDA's committee is scheduled to meet meet on Dec. 10 and Dec. 17 to review Pfizer's and Moderna's coronavirus vaccine candidates, respectively. FDA officials say their decisions on the vaccines could come days to weeks after the meetings — it depends on what questions come up.

Slaoui said he expected 60 million more vaccines by the end of January.

He said that covers many of the high-priority groups, including health care workers and people at high risk of severe disease and death from Covid-19.

Dr. Henry Walke, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Covid-19 incident manager, said that as Americans continue through the holiday season, they should avoid travel and stay home.

“We’re happy we’re coming out with this guidance now before the holiday season to provide additional consideration for the American public and health care providers, public health administrators to think through in terms of preventing infection,” Walke said Wednesday.

The reason for the recommendation to avoid travel is that cases are rising and hospitalizations and deaths are both increasing, Walke said. 

“We need to try to bend the curve, stop this exponential increase and so we’re really asking the American public to prevent these infections and avoid travel and wash their hands, wear a mask and maintain distance,” Walke said. 

Britain’s authorization of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine should give Americans more confidence in the safety of the vaccine and should speed authorization in the United States, US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Wednesday.

“While the FDA completes its review, the approval of another independent regulatory body should give Americans additional confidence in the quality of such a vaccine,” Azar told a briefing.

The FDA’s vaccine advisers are scheduled to discuss Pfizer’s application for emergency use authorization on December 10.

In a conference call with reporters, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said he spoke with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday about stimulus and has another talk scheduled today.

Hoyer emphasized he'd like for members to vote on before or on Dec. 10 so that members can return home and properly quarantine for 15 days before the holidays.

He said he thinks leaders can agree on the framework of a Covid-19 relief bill by end of this weekend and pass it through the House Thursday but admits it is "optimistic."  He said agreed with McConnell about trying to pass a bill before next weekend.

“I said, ‘Mitch, you know, we need to get this done. There’s no magic about another week.’ And he agreed on that," Hoyer said.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention hopes that more people might be willing to complete Covid-19 quarantine if the time period is reduced from 14 days – and that may result in fewer coronavirus infections, Dr. John Brooks, chief medical officer for the CDC’s Covid-19 response, said during a telebriefing on Wednesday.

There is some risk a person who has left quarantine before 14 days could transmit the virus to others. The decision to change quarantine guidance came after “extensive” modeling by the CDC and other agencies that showed the risk of low, Brooks said.

“We can safely reduce the length of quarantine, but accepting there is a small residual risk that a person who is leaving quarantine early could transmit to someone else if they became infectious,” Brooks said. 

If a person quarantined for 10 days and had no symptoms and no test, the residual risk of transmitting coronavirus to someone else after quarantine is estimated to be about 1%, with an upper limit of about 10%, the CDC said on its website.

If a person quarantined for seven days and had no symptoms and a negative test, the risk of transmitting coronavirus is about 5%, with an upper limit of about 12%. A test should be collected within 48 hours before quarantine intends to end, and quarantine should not end before seven days, even if rest results are returned earlier.

If a person who ended quarantine early goes on to develop symptoms within 14 days, they should contact their local health authority and health care provider, seek out testing and isolate.

Correction: An earlier version of this story included a quote with incorrect percentages on risks after quarantine. The risk after a seven-day quarantine, among other requirements, is about 5%, with an upper limit of about 12%.

US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield on Wednesday warned that the next few months are going to be rough, as the number of Covid-19 cases spike across the country.

Redfield says this is because as of today, 90% of the hospitals in this country are in the "red zone."

"Ninety percent of our hospitals in this nation are actually in what we call one of the hot zones in the red zone – therefore at risk for increased hospitalization and potential to negatively impact hospital capacity," Redfield said. "Ninety percent of all of our long-term care facilities are in what we call high transmission zones, so, we are at a very critical time right now about being able to maintain the resilience of our health care system."

Dr. Kelly Moore, associate director of the Immunization Action Coalition, which is supporting frontline workers who will administer Covid-19 vaccinations, said the first day that a vaccine is available is going to be "a really important learning day."

"Nobody's going to be running out of the gates to start vaccinating at full speed on day one," said Moore, who serves on the external advisory board for Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine.

Moore said day one will probably be designed to be a relatively small number of people vaccinated in controlled settings, so that those who are administering the vaccines can start learning how the product works and get experience giving the shots before they scale up and expand their offerings.

For example, Moore said vaccinators won't have access to product-specific factsheets and training materials until the US Food and Drug Administration authorizes emergency use of a coronavirus vaccine. She says her organization is waiting to see what the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posts before it can prepare materials to amplify what is distributed by the agency.

"CDC has informed states that they have a big stack of training job aids and training materials, and information, and training modules on these vaccines, ready to go, as soon as the emergency use is issued, but they can't post them or share them until the authorization is issued," Moore said. "We are preparing the groundwork for what we need to do, but we're in a holding pattern."

A CDC spokesperson told CNN it was their understanding that the materials do exist but cannot be distributed until the vaccine is given an emergency use authorization by the FDA.

In a statement, the FDA said, "We note that all printed material regarding the authorized emergency use of any vaccine must be consistent with the terms of the Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). This includes the fact sheets for health care providers and for patients/vaccine recipients, which will be available upon authorization."

Moore said the product-specific training materials must wait for the EUA because certain information contained in them is contingent on the FDA's decision.

She said the current vaccine timeline does not leave a big window for vaccinators to learn about the products.

"They're going to be moving directly from paper to practice with very little time in between. So, that could be a challenge for folks," Moore said.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends postponing travel over the upcoming winter holidays for people to keep themselves and their families as safe as possible.

“CDC recommends that the best way to protect yourself and others is to postpone travel and stay home,” said Dr. Henry Walke, the CDC’s Covid-19 incident manager, during a news briefing on Wednesday. 

If people do decide to travel, “CDC recommends that travelers consider getting tested one to three days before travel,” Walke said. “And then again three to five days after travel.” 

This should be combined with reducing non-essential activities for a full seven days after travel, he said. For those who do not get tested after travelling, CDC recommends that non-essential activities are reduced for ten days. 

Walke said if Covid-19 symptoms are experienced at any point during or after travelling, people should follow CDC or local guidance about what to do if a person gets sick.

There have been at least 13,741,687 cases of coronavirus in the US, and at least 270,881 people have died since the pandemic began, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

So far today, Johns Hopkins has reported 20,383 new cases and 239 reported deaths.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases.