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A panel that advised the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and reached a compromise between two high-risk groups voted on Sunday that people aged 75 and over should stand in line to get the coronavirus vaccine in the US along with around 30 To receive millions. “Key frontline workers” including rescue workers, teachers and grocery store workers.
The debate over who should get the vaccine in those first few months has become more urgent as the daily caseload has grown to numbers unimaginable a month ago. The country has already started vaccinating healthcare workers, and on Monday CVS and Walgreens were due to launch a mass vaccination campaign in the country’s nursing homes and long-term care facilities. This week, around six million doses of the newly approved Moderna vaccine are expected to arrive in more than 3,700 locations across the country, including many smaller and rural hospitals.
The panel of doctors and public health experts had previously announced that it would recommend a much broader group of Americans who were defined as essential workers – about 87 million people with jobs identified by a division of the Department of Homeland Security as critical to maintenance of the functioning of society. The next priority population and the elderly who live independently should come later.
But in hours of discussion on Sunday Committee members concluded that given the limited initial vaccine supply and the higher Covid-19 death rate among older Americans, it makes more sense to allow the oldest of them to move on with workers at the highest risk of exposure to the virus.
Groups of key workers, such as construction and food service workers, could be considered for the next wave. Members have made it clear that local organizations are very flexible in making these determinations.
“I firmly believe that we need a balance between saving lives and maintaining our infrastructure,” said Dr. Helen Talbot, Panel Member and Infectious Disease Specialist at Vanderbilt University.
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Answers to your vaccine questions
With a coronavirus vaccine spreading out of the US, here are answers to some questions you may be wondering about:
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- If I live in the US, when can I get the vaccine? While the exact order of vaccine recipients may vary from state to state, most doctors and residents of long-term care facilities will come first. If you want to understand how this decision is made, this article will help.
- When can I get back to normal life after the vaccination? Life will only get back to normal when society as a whole receives enough protection against the coronavirus. Once countries approve a vaccine, they can only vaccinate a few percent of their citizens in the first few months. The unvaccinated majority remain susceptible to infection. A growing number of coronavirus vaccines show robust protection against disease. However, it is also possible for people to spread the virus without knowing they are infected because they have mild or no symptoms. Scientists don’t yet know whether the vaccines will also block the transmission of the coronavirus. Even vaccinated people have to wear masks for the time being, avoid the crowds indoors and so on. Once enough people are vaccinated, it becomes very difficult for the coronavirus to find people at risk to become infected. Depending on how quickly we as a society achieve this goal, life could approach normal life from autumn 2021.
- Do I still have to wear a mask after the vaccination? Yeah, but not forever. Here’s why. The coronavirus vaccines are injected deep into the muscles and stimulate the immune system to produce antibodies. This seems to be sufficient protection to protect the vaccinated person from disease. However, it is unclear whether the virus can bloom and sneeze or exhale in the nose to infect others, even if antibodies have been mobilized elsewhere in the body to prevent the vaccinated person from getting sick. The vaccine clinical trials were designed to determine if people who were vaccinated are protected from disease – not to find out if they can still spread the coronavirus. Based on studies of flu vaccines and even patients infected with Covid-19, researchers have reason to hope that people who are vaccinated will not spread the virus, but more research is needed. In the meantime, everyone – including those who have been vaccinated – must imagine themselves as possible silent shakers and continue to wear a mask. Read more here.
- Will it hurt What are the side effects? The vaccine against Pfizer and BioNTech, like other typical vaccines, is delivered as a shot in the arm. The injection in your arm feels no different than any other vaccine, but the rate of short-lived side effects seems to be higher than with the flu shot. Tens of thousands of people have already received the vaccines, and none of them have reported serious health problems. The side effects, which can be similar to symptoms of Covid-19, last about a day and are more likely to occur after the second dose. Early reports from vaccine trials suggest that some people may need to take a day off because they feel lousy after receiving the second dose. In the Pfizer study, around half developed fatigue. Other side effects occurred in at least 25 to 33 percent of patients, sometimes more, including headache, chills, and muscle pain. While these experiences are not pleasant, they are a good sign that your own immune system is having a strong response to the vaccine that provides lasting immunity.
- Will mRNA vaccines change my genes?No. Moderna and Pfizer vaccines use a genetic molecule to boost the immune system. This molecule, known as mRNA, is eventually destroyed by the body. The mRNA is packaged in an oily bubble that can fuse with a cell, allowing the molecule to slide inside. The cell uses the mRNA to make proteins from the coronavirus that can stimulate the immune system. At any given moment, each of our cells can contain hundreds of thousands of mRNA molecules that they produce to make their own proteins. As soon as these proteins are made, our cells use special enzymes to break down the mRNA. The mRNA molecules that our cells make can only survive a few minutes. The mRNA in vaccines is engineered to withstand the cell’s enzymes a little longer, so the cells can make extra viral proteins and trigger a stronger immune response. However, the mRNA can hold for a few days at most before it is destroyed.
Together, the two groups for which the committee set a priority on Sunday have about 51 million people; Federal health officials have estimated that there should be enough vaccines to keep them all vaccinated by the end of February.
However, when the first week of vaccinations in the US came to an end, the frustrations were great Flare up about the pace of Distribution. This weekend, General Gustave F. Perna, who leads the Trump administration’s sales efforts, apologized for more than a dozen states that had learned at the last minute that they would receive fewer doses of the Pfizer-made vaccine next week than they expected had. Tensions have also risen in some states over local decisions about which health workers should get their shots immediately and which should wait.
The director of the C.D.C., Dr. Robert Redfield, will review the panel’s recommendation and is expected to decide by Monday whether it should be recognized as the agency’s official guidance to states. The panel, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, stressed that its recommendations are non-binding and that any state would be able to tweak or adapt them to meet the particular needs of its population.
The 13-to-1 vote came as frustrations flared over the pace of vaccine distribution. According to the United States, around 128,000 shots were fired in the first five days of the vaccine A New York Times database that tracks vaccinations – just over half of all new cases reported across the country on Friday. This weekend, General Gustave F. Perna, who leads the Trump administration’s sales efforts, apologized for at least 14 states learning at the last minute that they would receive fewer doses of the Pfizer-made vaccine next week than they expected . Tensions have also risen in some states over local decisions about which health workers should get their shots immediately and which should wait.
In addition to teachers, firefighters and police officers, a sub-group of the committee suggested that “frontline workers” should include school support staff. Day care, proofreading, public transportation, grocery and postal workers; and those who work in food production and manufacturing. However, the group’s official recommendation is not that specific.
Originally, the committee signaled last month that they were inclined to vaccinate 87 million vital workers in front of adults 65 and over. Many had expressed concern that key workers, often black, low-wage workers, were disproportionately affected by the virus and also disadvantaged because of their limited access to good health care.
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