President Trump announced that a new vaccine for Covid-19 will be available in April 2021. He also said that the state of New York does not want to receive the vaccine at that time.
“As soon as April the vaccine will be available to the entire general population with the exception of places like New York, where, for political reasons, the Governor decided to say, and I don’t think it’s good from a political standpoint, but he wants to take his time with the vaccine,” Trump stated at a news conference.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo has been one of the sharpest critics of President Trump regarding his handling of the pandemic. At one-point New York needed 40,000 ventilators for its coronavirus patients, and they only received 10,000 from President Trump. There was a stretch where the media was covering Gov. Cuomo every day until he got the resources he needed from the Federal government.
Over the past few months, Gov. Cuomo also stated that he would need approval from the healthcare community before distributing a vaccine approved by President Trump.
“We won’t be delivering it to New York until we have authorization to do so, and that pains me to say that. This is a very successful, amazing vaccine at 90% and more, but, so the governor, Governor Cuomo, will have to let us know when he’s ready for it, “ Trump stated.
Attorney General Letitia James said that she would be willing to sue the Trump administration if New York does not receive the vaccine when the rest of the country does. She released the following statement:
“This is nothing more than vindictive behavior by a lame-duck president trying to extract vengeance on those who oppose his politics. Once there is a fully-developed COVID-19 vaccine, we are confident that a Biden-Harris Administration will provide New York with the proper number of doses so that our state’s residents can achieve immunity. If dissemination of the vaccine takes place in the twilight of a Trump Administration and the president wants to play games with people’s lives, we will sue and we will win.”
Gov. Cuomo has gone to CNN live to clarify his statements. He does not want the state of New York to receive the vaccine later than any other state. However, he does not trust President Trump’s administration to verify and distribute the vaccine. Gov. Cuomo would like to see the approval from any of the federal government’s healthcare agencies before he approves the distribution of the vaccine for New York. With this vaccine, a timeline has been set for the beginning of the end of Covid-19.
While many Americans are frustrated with the rise in the number of cases and the death toll of 1,000 Americans per day, April seems like it is far away. However, there have been projections by Dr. Fauci of potential other vaccines being ready as early as December 2020-even though this is less likely. There is also a number of other vaccines in development that may be available in the beginning months of 2021.