Americans Could Start Receiving Pfizer’s COVID-19 Vaccine by ‘Monday or Tuesday,’ Health Official Says

Americans could start receiving Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine as soon as Monday or Tuesday, Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar said Friday on Good Morning America. The Food and Drug Administration is expected to issue the emergency use authorization for the vaccine within a few days after an FDA advisory panel endorsed the vaccine. Even though the authorization is expected soon, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows reportedly told FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn to give the authorization Friday or resign.

While on the ABC News show, Azar said the authorization for the first vaccine should come in “the next couple of days.” He later added, “We will work with Pfizer to get that shipped out, and so we could see people getting vaccinated Monday, Tuesday of next week.” The FDA told Pfizer it plans to “proceed towards an authorization for their vaccine,” Azar said. “So in the next couple of days, probably, as we work to negotiate with Pfizer the information doctors need to prescribe it appropriately, we should be seeing the authorization of this first vaccine.”

Officials predicted about 20 million Americans could be vaccinated in December, either with Pfizer’s vaccine or Moderna’s vaccine, which is also expected to be approved soon, reports The Hill. Azar predicted 100 million Americans could be vaccinated by the end of February. However, most Americans will not have access to the vaccines until the spring, meaning Americans still have to take the virus seriously during the winter months.

On Friday morning, Hahn and Peter Marks, the director for the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, issued a joint statement confirming the FDA will “rapidly work toward finalization and issuance of an emergency use authorization.” The agency also told the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Operation Warp Speed about the advisory panel’s approval so they can “execute their plans for timely vaccine distribution.”

However, the Trump Administration is still adding more pressure on the FDA to approve the vaccine. President Donald Trump called the FDA a “big, old slow turtle” and demanded Hahn “stop playing games and start saving lives.” Sources also told The Washington Post that Trump’s chief of staff asked Hahn the FDA needs to approve the Pfizer vaccine by the end of Friday or he should resign. A White House official declined to comment, but said Meadows “regularly requests updates on progress toward a vaccine.”