YES, we are getting there as one country, closer than ever to defeating COVID-19, and the path toward a better, healthier and stronger America is becoming wider and brighter.
The New York Times reported that based on all data and indicators, columnist David Leonhardt optimistically stated on May 21, Friday, that “The pandemic may now be in permanent retreat in the U.S.”
“More than 60 percent of American adults have received at least one vaccine shot, and the share is growing by about two percentage points per week. Among unvaccinated people, a substantial number have already had COVID and therefore have some natural immunity,” Leonhardt reported, based on his discussion with Andy Slavitt, one of President Biden’s top COVID adviser. “The virus is running out of places to be communicable”, Slavitt told Leonhardt.
“The share of COVID tests coming back positive has fallen below 3 percent for the first time since widespread testing began, and the number of hospitalized patients has fallen to the lowest point in 11 months,” the Times cited Dr. Eric Topol, physician-scientist, author and editor of Scripps Research.
Dr. Topol posted on Twitter on Thursday May 20, that “U.S. vaccinations reported today hit over 281.5 million doses, 85% seniors, with 800,000 newbies (Now 161 million people with at least 1 dose). Another day towards real containment. 200 million Americans = 60% of total population.”
Meanwhile “it is truly a momentous day” here in the San Francisco Bay Area, according to Dr. Vivek Jain. “For the first time since March 5 of last year, San Francisco General Hospital yesterday had no COVID patients,” the report stated.
While infection rate remains high in areas where there is “resistance” to vaccination including in the Southeast, and 600 Americans continue to die because of the pandemic every day, the Times report stated that we are on track to see a lower death rate in the coming months, given the sharp decline in cases in the past month.
As the spread of the virus was exponential in growth, leading to more infection, more hospitalization, more deaths, the same principle apply on the reverse mode, precisely why the goal was to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 by all means possible — lockdowns, stay at home directives, social distancing, wearing of mask, avoiding crowds, and getting people vaccinated.
“Every case of COVID-19 that is prevented cuts off transmission chains, which prevents many more cases down the line,” wrote Zoë McLaren in her essay for the Times.
Case in point cited by the report: Britain. According to the Times report, “In Britain, one of the few countries to have given a shot to a greater share of the population than the U.S., deaths are down more than 99 percent from their peak.”
We are in a much better place, brimming with hope and optimism than where we used to be less than five months ago. Unfortunately, many countries in the world are not as blessed as we are here in the United States.
Let us again look at the big picture. According to the New York Times: “The coronavirus pandemic has sickened more than 165,520,500 people, according to official counts. As of Friday morning, May 21, at least 3,428,800 people have died from coronavirus.
While globally, especially with the vaccine roll-out, cases are down by 23% from their peak in late April, there are countries where the cases are higher and are staying high, and some have had the highest growth in newly reported deaths over the last 14 days.
On Monday, May 17, President Joe Biden announced that the United States would send an additional 20 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines — all approved for domestic use — to help countries in need. “That is in addition to the 60 million doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine he pledged last month, though those doses are not approved for domestic use and cannot be released until regulators deem them safe,” according to the Times.
The Times reported that this is the first time Biden has pledged to give away doses that could be used in the United States.
“America will never be fully safe until the pandemic that’s raging globally is under control,” Biden acknowledged. “No ocean’s wide enough, no wall’s high enough, to keep us safe,” the president added.
However, the Times pointed out the significance of this donation “as another step toward what Mr. Biden promised would be an entirely new effort to increase vaccine supplies and vastly expand manufacturing capacity, most of it in the United States. He also put Jeffrey Zients, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, in charge of developing a global strategy.”
Biden’s announcement came shortly after the World Health Organization director general, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus appealed to countries with high vaccination rates “to do more to help countries that were being hit hard by the coronavirus, or the entire world would be imperiled.”
Biden took office vowing to restore the United States as a leader in global public health, and according to the Times report, “he has taken certain steps to do so: rejoining the World Health Organization, pledging $4 billion to an international vaccine effort and providing financial support to help Biological E, a vaccine manufacturer in India, produce at least one billion doses of coronavirus vaccines by the end of 2022.”
However, activists are calling on the president to do more wartime effort to broaden the supply of COVID-19 vaccines beyond his reported “support” for waiving intellectual property protections for coronavirus vaccines: “Mr. Biden must create the conditions for pharmaceutical companies to transfer their intellectual property to vaccine makers overseas.”
“There must be a global strategy led by the U.S. that’s based on technology transfer, on forcing pharma to come to the table to share the recipe,” said AIDS activist Asia Russell.
The Times reported that a bipartisan group including business leaders, diplomats and a former defense secretary, wrote an open letter to President Biden to do more. The organizer of the open letter, Hank Greenberg, a 96-year-old veteran of World War II, said he was inspired to write after a former chief executive of an A.I.G. subsidiary who later became the ambassador from the Philippines to the United States told him he was not able to get vaccinated.
Like Mr. Biden, Greenberg used language that evoked the war effort,” the report stated.
“If we don’t do it,” he asked, “who will?”
* * *
The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.
* * *
Gel Santos Relos has been in news, talk, public service and educational broadcasting since 1989 with ABS-CBN and is now serving the Filipino audience using different platforms, including digital broadcasting, and print, and is working on a new public service program for the community. You may contact her through email at [email protected], or send her a message via Facebook at Facebook.com/Gel.Santos.Relos.
