President-elect Joe Biden implored Americans to wear masks to slow the spread of the coronavirus, even as he cheered news about the promising development of a vaccine being developed by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer.
Biden in remarks after meeting his newly formed coronavirus advisory board cautioned that Americans still face "a dark winter" and need to be aggressive about mask wearing and social distancing as infections continue to surge around the country.
Though Pfizer announced promising results from a vaccine trial and is on track to file an emergency use application with regulators this month, Biden noted it could be months before a vaccine is widely available.
"We could save tens of thousands of lives if everyone would just wear a mask for the next few months. Not Democratic or Republican lives, American lives," Biden said. "Please, I implore you, wear a mask."
Leaving WHO in a pandemic was “the most ruinous decision in modern presidential history,” @LawrenceGostin told @juliaoftoronto.
— Vox (@voxdotcom) November 9, 2020
Joe Biden says he will rejoin on day one in office. https://t.co/jYHzVrsqXh
The Democrat's transition team also unveiled members of Biden's coronavirus working group tasked with developing his Administration's pandemic response — something Biden says he wants to put in motion as soon as he takes office in January.
The board will be led by former Surgeon General Dr Vivek Murthy, former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner David Kessler and Yale University public health care expert Dr Marcella Nunez-Smith.
Pfizer, which developed the vaccine with the German drugmaker BioNTech, said it is on track to file an emergency use application with US regulators this month.
Biden is starting his transition plans as the pandemic climbs to a new high point. Over the past two weeks, the number of confirmed Covid-19 cases has risen nearly 65 per cent: the 7-day rolling average for daily new cases in the US went from 66,294 on October 25 to 108,736.7 on November 8.
The Biden-Harris transition has announced its Covid-19 Advisory Board: pic.twitter.com/FKCHeNics3
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) November 9, 2020
In the past week, one out of every 433 Americans was diagnosed with Covid-19. Hospitals in several states are running out of space and staff, and the death toll is soaring. So far, the US has recorded more than 9.8 million infections and more than 237,000 deaths from Covid-19.
The White House task force, which includes the federal government's leading infectious disease expert Dr Anthony Fauci, has been diminished in recent months as Trump grew impatient that efforts to slow the virus was having deleterious impact on the economy.
After declaring victory on Sunday, Biden quickly pivoted from a bitter campaign battle to reining in the pandemic that has hit the world's most powerful nation harder than any other.
Biden announced the members of his advisory board will develop a blueprint for fighting the pandemic. It includes doctors and scientists who have served in previous administrations, many of them experts in public health, vaccines and infectious diseases.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson confirms the UK has 40 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine - enough for a third of the population, with two doses needed per person.
— SkyNews (@SkyNews) November 9, 2020
But adds "we absolutely cannot rely on the news as a solution".
Follow live: https://t.co/RngWB9jHlv pic.twitter.com/bfXok7uOwk
Notable among the members is Rick Bright, a vaccine expert and former head of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority. He had filed a whistleblower complaint alleging he was reassigned to a lesser job because he resisted political pressure to allow widespread use of hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug pushed by Trump as a Covid-19 treatment.
Other members include Dr Luciana Borio, who had senior leadership positions at the FDA and National Security Council during the Obama and Trump administrations; Dr Ezekiel Emanuel, who served as a special adviser for health policy in the Obama Administration; Dr Atul Gawande, a senior adviser in the Department of Health and Human Services in the Clinton administration and medical writer; and Michael Osterholm, an epidemiologist who served as an adviser to Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson during the George W. Bush administration.
Public health officials warn that the nation is entering the worst stretch yet for Covid-19 as winter sets in and the holiday season approaches, increasing the risk of rapid transmission as Americans travel, shop and celebrate with loved ones.
"The next two months are going to be rough, difficult ones," said Dr Albert Ko, an infectious disease specialist and department chairman at the Yale School of Public Health. "We could see another 100,000 deaths by January."
NEW: Ben Carson tests positive for coronavirushttps://t.co/pqy1y2Umaz
— Axios (@axios) November 9, 2020
Biden pledged during the campaign to make testing free and widely available; to hire thousands of health workers to help implement contact-tracing programmes; and to instruct the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention to provide clear, expert-informed guidelines, among other proposals.
Much of what Biden has proposed will take congressional action, and he's certain to face challenges in a closely divided House and Senate.
Establishing some consensus with state leaders on a national response, including a nationwide mask mandate, should be a top priority. Opposition to wearing masks remains a stubborn issue, particularly in some of the hardest-hit states.
"Each state is acting fairly autonomously on their own policies, and we've seen how that's played out," said Ko. "This disease needs national and global responses."
As of November 8, the seven-day average of daily new #coronavirus cases was more than 111,000 — a record high.
— Vox (@voxdotcom) November 9, 2020
America’s third #Covid19 surge, explained: https://t.co/B0u9hvgXje
During his first remarks as president-elect, Biden said on Sunday that his Covid-19 task force will create a plan "built on bedrock science" and "constructed out of compassion, empathy and concern."
There's also hope in the wider medical community that a Biden presidency will help restore US leadership on global public health challenges, including the development and distribution of a vaccine when it becomes available.
Dr Soumya Swaminathan, the chief scientist of the World Health Organisation, said she was more optimistic that a Biden administration would join Covax, a WHO-led project aimed to help deploy vaccines to the neediest people worldwide, whether they live in rich or poor countries.
"Everyone recognises that for a pandemic, you cannot have a country-by-country approach. You need a global approach," Swaminathan said.
- AP