Watch the AMA's daily COVID-19 update, with insights from AMA leaders and experts about the pandemic.
Featured topic and speakers
In today’s COVID-19 Update, AMA's Chief Health and Science Officer Mira Irons, MD, discusses the Johnson & Johnson vaccination pause, expanding eligibility for receiving COVID vaccines, tracking variants, and the latest numbers and trending topics related to the pandemic.
Learn more at the AMA COVID-19 resource center.
Speakers
- Mira Irons, MD, chief health and science officer, AMA
Transcript
Unger: Hello, this is the American Medical Association's COVID-19 Update. Today, we have our weekly look at the numbers, trends and latest news about COVID-19 with AMA's Chief Health and Science Officer Dr. Mira Irons, in Chicago. I'm Todd Unger, AMA's chief experience officer in Chicago. Dr. Irons, a lot's happened since last week when we spoke. Starting with the pause on the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, can you talk about the latest news, and how it's affecting our overall vaccine efforts?
Dr. Irons: Oh, sure. Todd. The federal government's pause on use of the Johnson and Johnson single shot vaccine will last at least until the end of the week. As you know, the ACIP Committee met last week. They actually deferred taking a vote, because they wanted more information. And that deferred meeting is scheduled for this Friday, April 23, to discuss additional safety data that the CDC could collect related to the small number of blood clotting cases that we've seen with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine recipients. That meeting is scheduled for 11 o'clock to 5:00 p.m. Eastern time. And it's a public meeting. If people want to tune into it, they could go to the ACIP home page and the web link will be there.
It could conclude with a vote, for example, to recommend to continue the pause, to continue the pause for certain populations or to rescind the pause altogether. The federal government could then act quickly to follow the guidance.
Although he didn't want to get ahead of the CDC and the FDA, Dr. Fauci, over the weekend, said he expected experts to recommend some sort of either warning or restriction on the use of the vaccine. But with the pause still in place, state health departments have rescheduled appointments and substituted either the Pfizer BioNTech or Moderna vaccines, a plan that White House officials have referenced as a quick way to make up for the gap.
Unger: And, if our viewers would like more information on the Johnson and Johnson pause, they can check out a couple of videos that we did last week. One with Dr. Sandra Fryhofer and her update from the ACIP, as well as an interview with Dr. Susan Bailey, the AMA's president and Dr. Peter Marks from the FDA. Those are available on AMA's YouTube channel. Well, Dr. Irons, you mentioned the gap and what's happening as we try to scramble to kind of fill in for missed appointments and things like that. Are we able to fill the gap due to the Johnson and Johnson pause?
Dr. Irons: Yeah, it appears that we are. White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator, Jeff Zients, stressed last week that the pause in the J&J vaccine would not have a significant impact on the current pace of vaccinations in the U.S. He said there was more than enough supply of the Pfizer BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines.
Currently, the Johnson and Johnson vaccine has only accounted for a fraction of U.S. vaccinations, but it is a key tool on the Biden administration's strategy to get our nation vaccinated going forward. The shot can be kept at normal refrigeration temperatures for three months and at one dose, allow for people to dispense with vaccination in a single trip.
Some public health officials worry the pause may deepen hesitancy. And there are concerns about the risks pause to the global vaccination drive in countries that can't afford to be particular about shots. To date, about 7.9 million Americans have received the Johnson and Johnson shot, with about 10 million doses unused.
Unger: Well, I guess the good news is that we're seeing supply finally kind of get up to speed, in some places an actual surplus. That's kind of a strange situation after all these months to be in. Which is good news, especially because a big event this week is the expansion of vaccine eligibility. Can you talk about that?
Dr. Irons: Oh, absolutely. We've been waiting for this and the increased availability of supply for several months now, and all of a sudden we're pretty much here. All adults in every U.S. state, Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico are now eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine, meeting the April 19 deadline that President Biden set two weeks ago. The United States is administering an average of 3.2 million doses a day, up from roughly 2-1/2 million a month before. More than 131 million people have received at least one shot as of Sunday, according to the CDC. And about 84.3 million people have been fully vaccinated.
At its current pace, the U.S. will vaccinate 70% of its population by mid-June. However, vaccine hesitancy could slow progress toward herd immunity, which will also depend on vaccinating children. The administration mounted an intense push on Monday to persuade Americans to get vaccinated. This is going to be really, really important, an effort that coincided with the President's deadline to extend vaccine eligibility to all adults, age 16 or older.
Unger: Yes, it's hard to believe that after what is now more than a year, we have the solution in front of us. Folks, get vaccinated so we can reach those numbers that we need to as quickly as possible. You talked about the acceleration of vaccination numbers, so that's a really good story. What are we seeing on the opposite end, in terms of new cases and deaths?
Dr. Irons: So we're still not out of the woods. The new cases and deaths are still continuing. The current numbers are 31,739,364 confirmed cases and 567,729 deaths. At least 352 new coronavirus deaths and 40,482 new cases were reported in the U.S. on Sunday. Those numbers are a little lower than what they have been over the week. Over the past week, there's been an average of 67,308 cases per day, an increase of 5% from the average two weeks earlier.
We've talked about this before. Those numbers are just too high to be daily averages. This number is up from over 54,000 a month ago and public health experts are warning Americans not to let their guards down. Eleven states have seen a 25% increase in cases and they're kind of scattered around the country.
Globally, we continue to see high numbers as well. The global death toll from COVID-19 recently surpassed the three million mark. The U.S., Brazil and Mexico lead the world in COVID-19 deaths. Infections, globally, total more than 140 million. And the pace of deaths has been accelerating. The world did not record one million deaths until September 28th, 2020, but there were two million by January 15th, less than four months later and the third million just took three months. So we're still in this.
Unger: Those are some tragic milestones, I guess, would be an understatement. We are seeing too, that those averages that we're seeing in the U.S. are a little bit misleading, because as you point out, in some places we're seeing some pretty drastic numbers that need to be brought under control. Let's talk a little bit more about the trends. What are you seeing right now, as you look deeper into those numbers?
Dr. Irons: Well, it's all about the race between the variants and the vaccines. The spread has been, and continues to be largely driven by variants. In respond to this concern, the White House on Friday announced an almost $2 billion plan for expanding and improving the nation's ability to track coronavirus variants, an effort that public health experts have said is desperately needed to fight against variants that could drive another wave or potentially undermine the effectiveness of vaccines.
More than half of the funding, one billion dollars, would go to the CDC and states to monitor those variants by examining positive virus test samples. The CDC has so far leaned heavily on commercial laboratories to conduct the work. The rest of the funding would go to two programs that appear to be aimed at organizing a more permanent architecture for sequencing samples. Four hundred million dollars would go to what the White House described as partnerships between state health departments and academic institutions. They could help develop new surveillance methods for tracking viruses. And 300 million would go to creating a unified system that would allow scientists to store, share and make sense of vast amounts of new data. The goal is to quickly detect the spread of variants and enable prompt decisions about stopping them.
Unger: Like so many things in this pandemic, it really does come down to being able to measure and have the data to point us in the right direction. Well, last, any other key messages that AMA wants folks to hear this week?
Dr. Irons: Absolutely and this one is really important, especially at this time. We're really at a pivotal time at this point. Up until now, the demand for the vaccine has been higher than the supply. And now that we're switching into having all this supply, we're going to start seeing the hesitancy that's out there. And it's really important to talk to as many people as we can and give them the facts.
So, on April 19, the AMA released a statement encouraging all Americans to get vaccinated as soon as possible. Now that all people 16 and up are eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine in all 50 states, nearly 40% of the U.S. population has gotten at least one dose and more than a quarter of the population is fully vaccinated.
Now, it's your turn because vaccines work, and they save lives. Even as more transmissible and dangerous strains of COVID-19 spread, vaccinations have helped flatten the curve, offering a clear path toward normalcy. For your health, for your loved ones and for your community, we urge you to get vaccinated.
The statement goes on to say, if you or people you love have questions about vaccine, we urge you to talk to your physician. The consensus of public health and medical professionals confirms that vaccines are the best way to defeat this virus, with benefits far outweighing the risk for most people. If you continue to have questions, we urge you to learn more from reputable sources, including www.getvaccineanswers.org, the CDC, the AMA or other public health authorities.
Unger: Well, thank you so much, Dr. Irons. That's great advice. If you have a loved one, please encourage them to get a vaccine. If they have questions, talk to their doctor.
Dr. Irons: Yep.
Unger: Well, that's it for today's COVID-19 Update. We'll be back with another segment shortly. And for additional information on COVID-19, visit ama-assn.org/COVID-19. Thanks for joining us today. Please take care.
Disclaimer: The viewpoints expressed in this video are those of the participants and/or do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the AMA.
