COVID-19 Vaccine Scalability: When Can We Expect the Vaccine?
By: Karthik Mittal
Tags: Global, Enjoy Writing, Vaccines, Coronavirus, Healthcare

When individuals are asked to describe 2020 in one word, COVID-19 often springs up in people’s minds. The COVID-19 quarantine has changed every aspect of our lives, from school to extracurricular activities. It has been over eight and a half months since the quarantine has started, so it makes sense that many individuals are restless, wanting to return back to their daily lives.

Media outlets and news sources are constantly discussing the possibility of exiting this quarantine through the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine; however, although this vaccine has been approved, there are still many questions left to be answered. Who will receive these vaccines first? What will be the general rollout? When can we see widespread vaccination? What is a likely time that we will get out of this quarantine?

This article aims to address some of these concerns and provide an overview to what the vaccine is and what the current methods of scaling it are.

A Brief Overview

Through a shot in the upper arm, the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine uses a technique known as mRNA to give instructions to make a harmless piece known as the “spike protein”, often found on the surface of the COVID-19 afflicted cells; immune systems can learn how to fight against these harmless spike proteins so that they are more prepared when the human body is exposed to the real COVID-19.

Although there have been some allergic reactions and side effects to this vaccine, through evidence in clinical trials, there has shown to be over a 95% efficacy in preventing COVID-19 illness within individuals with no prior infection. By simply taking two shots 21 days apart, many individuals can stop the spread of COVID-19.

On December 11, 2020, the FDA issued the first EUA (emergency use authorization) for a vaccine to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in individuals aged 16 years of age and older. Since this is an incredibly unique case, governmental programs were not prepared for vaccine rollout and had to make the best plan in a limited amount of time.

According to the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, the vaccine should go to the following groups of individuals first.

Phase 1: Front-line health care workers and individuals in long-term care facilities (including doctors, nurses, and the severely ill)

Front-line health care workers and individuals in long-term care facilities (including doctors, nurses, and the severely ill) Phase 2: People aged 75 and older and front-line essential workers (including teachers, grocery store workers, firefighters, police, etc.)

People aged 75 and older and front-line essential workers (including teachers, grocery store workers, firefighters, police, etc.) Phase 3: People aged 65 to 74, people aged 16 to 64 with high-risk medical conditions (like Type 2 diabetes, heart conditions, sickle cell disease, etc.), and other essential workers.

The plan outlined above shows a solid plan and which individuals to reach out to first; however, it is still unclear on how they plan to implement this.

Problems with Vaccine Rollout

Map showing the extent of COVID-19 cases. Credit: Google News Initiative

It is clear that giving vaccines to a country with over 300 million individuals will be a monumental task and can not be conquered in just one night. While many believe that the issue will be getting an adequate supply of vaccines, I believe that the main issue will be actually giving the vaccine to Americans. As former FDA chief and Pfizer board member Dr. Scott Gottlieb said,

The supply ramps very quickly as you move out and the more you push out that timeframe into 2021 by a week or two weeks, you have less supply in 2020. I’m hopeful that we’re going to have adequate supply in 2021 and it’s going to ramp very quickly.

Vaccine rollout has often been pushed to state rather than federal control, leading to a decentralized and unproductive environment. Different states are taking different steps in vaccination, leading to a disjointed process in overall.

The health department states that states like Colorado and Virginia are still approaching Phase 1 of rollout while states like Maryland and New York and moving on to further eligibility steps. This is mainly because some states have fewer residents in high-risk categories than others, making it extremely difficult for health officials to coordinate the best action plan.

This disjointedness will catch up with America as some groups of individuals in a particular state will be vaccinated before those same groups in different states; this will ultimately lead to conflict and tension in the long run because of people’s want to immediately get the vaccine.

The last issue lies in the lack of communication between the government and the American people; many individuals are clueless about the current state of the vaccine and are unaware of vaccine rollout protocols. As Tinglong Dai, a John Hopkins professor studying operations management and business analytics, said,

I wouldn’t be surprised if thousands of individuals get left out because of the information gap.

Although states like New York are setting up websites to check for vaccine eligibility, many individuals are unwilling or unable to take those additional steps to check where they are in the vaccine rollout process. Right now, many states plan to rely on traditional media campaigns and social outreach to spread the word out to the people; however, this may prove to be ineffective in the long run.

I believe that the states are heading in the right direction by employing pharmacies like CVS and Walgreens and building digital platforms for people to determine their eligibility; however, they need to be much more proactive if they mean to vaccinate everyone in an orderly manner.

What’s Next?

Federal officials currently hope that around 50 million individuals will have received their first shot by the end of January, and there are rumors that the government should have enough supply so that all Americans who want to get vaccinated can by summer 2021. They mainly plan on spreading this by partnering with pharmacy chains to provide vaccine supplies to individuals that need it.

Many states are only just starting to approach the vaccine rollout process and still have a long way to go before widespread vaccination; there will be many hurdles up ahead before we can go out of our homes feeling comfortable.

However, if responsible individuals will address each of the issues listed above, building a strong, centralized, and informative platform to spread vaccine awareness, the path towards recovery will be a safe and successful one. Comment below if you want a more in-depth article on the Pfizer vaccine itself and the struggles to get it to where it is now.

TL;DR

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has over a 95% efficacy in preventing COVID-19 and started being rolled out in the US on December 11, 2020.

The CDC plans to target older individuals who might be more susceptible to COVID as well as front-line essential care workers first.

The main issues currently with vaccine rollouts are in their decentralized approach and the lack of information provided to the people (about the vaccine itself and who’s eligible for the vaccine first).

Only if individuals create a centralized and informative platform, then vaccine rollout can be successful across America.

Additional Resources

Hi! I am a 16 year old currently interested in the fields of machine learning and biotechnology. If you are interested in seeing more of my content and what I publish, consider subscribing to my newsletter! Check out my newsletter here! Also, check out my LinkedIn and Github pages. If you’re interested in talking about autonomous vehicles or just technology in general, sign up for a chat using my Calendly.