Good morning! It has been 360 days since the first documented human case of COVID-19. Yesterday was a big day for this newsletter; the number of daily reads tripled. I guess folks were interested in hearing about the vaccine! Whatever you are all doing to share this with others, I am very grateful to have earned your support and glad that you find the newsletter useful.
I have lots of vaccine questions. No idea if you'll be able to answer them. My main questions on the Pfizer vaccine and any other vaccine is what the process may look like to sign up to get it. Who will be in charge of distribution? Is it going to be completely private sector, whatever hospital or pharmacy or logistics company happens to get their hands on some doses will make a signup form and there'll be a mob rush to sign up, and when they have a dose available and decide you're eligible they call you up? Will the government be involved in choosing and/or distributing who gets a dose when? What metrics will be used to decide? Is there an argument between, say, blanketing Wisconsin or some other state that's doing particularly badly first and getting everyone in the state vaccinated and then moving to other states, vs. a more distributed approach where every state will get some vaccine doses initially but not enough to cover their whole population?
And are the different vaccines different enough in how they might potentially be distributed that these questions must wait until a particular vaccine receives approval before deciding who gets doses when, or could this all be decided and transparently explained ahead of time to the broader public in detail this winter even if mass distribution won't happen until next year? Why isn't there a way for me to sign up now and get an assignment like "Based on your geographical location, health condition, and randomization, you have been placed in vaccine distribution subdivision D4, which will receive vaccination approximately when doses # 80 million to 100 million have been produced and distributed. You will be contacted to schedule vaccination appointments when this happens and we will keep you up to date as the timeline becomes clear." ?
Also, what are social interaction protocols going to look like once part of the population has received the vaccine? Will you be able to open up restaurants for indoor dining but only for vaccinated people, and if so, how do you identify vaccinated people? Or is it wiser practice to wait until some large percentage of the population has been vaccinated, or until the disease rate is under some target, even if theoretically it would be reasonably safe for vaccinated people to go out?
I have lots of vaccine questions. No idea if you'll be able to answer them. My main questions on the Pfizer vaccine and any other vaccine is what the process may look like to sign up to get it. Who will be in charge of distribution? Is it going to be completely private sector, whatever hospital or pharmacy or logistics company happens to get their hands on some doses will make a signup form and there'll be a mob rush to sign up, and when they have a dose available and decide you're eligible they call you up? Will the government be involved in choosing and/or distributing who gets a dose when? What metrics will be used to decide? Is there an argument between, say, blanketing Wisconsin or some other state that's doing particularly badly first and getting everyone in the state vaccinated and then moving to other states, vs. a more distributed approach where every state will get some vaccine doses initially but not enough to cover their whole population?
And are the different vaccines different enough in how they might potentially be distributed that these questions must wait until a particular vaccine receives approval before deciding who gets doses when, or could this all be decided and transparently explained ahead of time to the broader public in detail this winter even if mass distribution won't happen until next year? Why isn't there a way for me to sign up now and get an assignment like "Based on your geographical location, health condition, and randomization, you have been placed in vaccine distribution subdivision D4, which will receive vaccination approximately when doses # 80 million to 100 million have been produced and distributed. You will be contacted to schedule vaccination appointments when this happens and we will keep you up to date as the timeline becomes clear." ?
Also, what are social interaction protocols going to look like once part of the population has received the vaccine? Will you be able to open up restaurants for indoor dining but only for vaccinated people, and if so, how do you identify vaccinated people? Or is it wiser practice to wait until some large percentage of the population has been vaccinated, or until the disease rate is under some target, even if theoretically it would be reasonably safe for vaccinated people to go out?