General Gus Perna, giving Warp Speed briefing right now:
First shipments leaving Pfizer within 24 hours, will arrive at providers starting on Monday.
Describes this as "D-Day," but notes that it doesn't mean "distribution" as some as thought. It's the military designation for the beginning of an operation.
Perna: No vaccine pre-dispositioned, bc didn't want to presume EUA.
"Under no circumstances did we want to get ahead of the great FDA."
But says there were staging exercises, etc.
Perna says he still believes 40M doses available/distributed by end of month, though sounded like it all depends on seeing how many vaccines actually roll off the production lines. (Which makes sense.)
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Public health officials were raising alarms in January and by the middle of the month some were discussing using the Defense Production Act to speed manufacturing of supplies...
2/x
By early February, officials were warning that the U.S. would have dangerous supply shortages, including if the all-important N95 masks.
But administration has focused on this only recently, still doesn’t seem to have a handle on it.
3/x
Rhode Island @GovRaimondo on @MSNBC right now, explaining that state has started a COVID hotline and (using National Guard) set up a network of facilities, mostly tents, for drive-up testing.
Smart and something other states should consider.
Just to provide some more detail on, it sounds like you call the hotline and, if testing is appropriate, they'll tell you where to go to get tested.
What officials don't want is tons of people people taking themselves to clinics, ER for testing.
Emphasizes health care -- protection of ACA pre-existing condition protections, Medicaid expansion. This was also a big part of her campaign.
Also: "The Obama-Biden" auto industry rescue.
More on health care: Emphasizes common thread between Biden and Sanders, both trying to expand coverage. Then pivots to "Obama-Biden" record, including passage and defense of ACA:
"When the chips were down, they had our back."
Auto industry reference is noteworthy.
GM/Chrysler rescue was a huge, still under-appreciated factor in Obama's 2012 reelection.
Could it help Biden in 2020? It's been a while, may be less effective when Romney isn't opponent.
In case you missed it yesterday -- say, because you were watching the impeachment vote -- a federal appeals court ruled that the ACA's individual mandate is unconstitutional.
As you'll remember, this lawsuit claims Trump & the Republican Congress introduced a fatal constitutional flaw into the 2010 health care law when they reduced the "individual mandate" penalty to zero.