Many of the new administration’s claims about coronavirus vaccines are, at best, politically convenient half-truths.
Many of the new administration’s claims about coronavirus vaccines are, at best, politically convenient half-truths.
C an somebody tell President Biden that the election is over? Since he was sworn in six weeks ago, he hasn’t stopped denigrating the Trump administration’s COVID-19-vaccination program. His statements are unbecoming, counterproductive, and, worst of all, mostly false.
Immediately after January’s inauguration, Biden’s team claimed that Trump had left it no vaccine plan, that Biden would have to “build everything from scratch” and start “from square one.” Dr. Anthony Fauci disputed these claims, and for good reason: In fact, the Trump administration left Biden with two approved vaccines and 17 million doses already administered, the fifth-best vaccination rate in the world on a per capita basis and the second-best among large countries.
On February 11, Biden complained that the U.S. vaccine program was “in much worse shape” than he’d expected and that his team had been misled. The remarks prompted Brett Morgenstern, a former White House official involved in the Trump team’s coronavirus response, to respond that the outgoing administration had laid out vaccination plans for the incoming administration well in advance. “That is why the new Administration’s goals were being surpassed before they even came into office,” Morgenstern said. “Enough with the lies, excuses & political pot shots. Time to lead.” (Biden officials had repeatedly claimed they would improve the vaccination rate to a million a day, despite clear evidence that that goal was already being met by inauguration day.)
A week later, at a Pfizer manufacturing plant, Biden asserted, “My predecessor — as my mother would say, ‘God love him’ — failed to order enough vaccines, failed to mobilize the effort to administer the shots, failed to set up vaccine centers. That changed the moment we took office.” And on March 2 Biden claimed, “When we came into office, the prior administration had contracted for not nearly enough vaccine to cover adults in America. We rectified that.”
In fact, the Trump administration had contracted last August for 300 million doses — 100 million from each company — with the three companies (Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson) that now have FDA-approved vaccines. The administration contracted for another 100 million doses each of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines in December, meaning that it had contracted for 500 million doses of approved vaccine before Biden assumed office. That is more than enough to vaccinate the 209 million American adults Biden referred to. And while the Biden administration did recently arrange for 200 million more doses — 100 million each from Pfizer and Moderna — those doses will not be available until the end of July.
Contrary to Biden’s claims of insufficiency, the Trump administration contracted for 800 million doses with six companies using three different technologies last spring and summer, at a time when no one knew which of the companies’ products would progress to FDA approval. Three-hundred million of those doses were of the now-approved vaccines discussed above. Another 300 million doses were to come from Astra-Zeneca, which, at the time the agreement was made in May of last year, was the clear front-runner in the race to produce an approved vaccine — its Phase I trial had started the previous month, and the lead researcher in charge of its development predicted trials could conclude by September. While the Astra-Zeneca vaccine was approved in the United Kingdom at the end of December, in the European Union in January, and in Canada in February, it has still not yet been approved here. But it is likely to be authorized here in the near future, and in any event one can hardly blame the Trump administration for betting on a vaccine that showed such promise.
President Biden came into office claiming he would seek unity, but his unrelenting partisan criticism of the preceding administration is only sowing division. Perhaps Biden is just trying to magnify his accomplishments by lowering expectations. But if he truly has the country’s best interests at heart, he should build on the unprecedented accomplishments of the Trump administration — overseeing and helping to fund the development and production of three brand-new vaccines for a novel disease in less than a year — and encourage the nation to work as one to end the pandemic.