U.S. health authorities will hold an emergency meeting next week to recommend that a coronavirus vaccine awaiting approval be given first to healthcare professionals and people in long-term care facilities.
The meeting, announced on Friday by a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) committee on immunizations, suggests that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) may be close to authorizing distribution of the long-awaited medication, at least to those considered most vulnerable.
United Airlines has begun moving shipments of the vaccine, developed by Pfizer Inc, on charter flights to ensure it can be quickly distributed once it is approved, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will vote on Tuesday to recommend that the FDA allow healthcare professionals and long-term care facilities to be the first two groups to get initial vaccine supplies, a CDC spokeswoman said.
A green light for any vaccine would come as welcome news to Americans, who political leaders have clamped under increasingly aggressive measures to curtail the spread of the virus.
Los Angeles County health officials on Friday banned all public and private gatherings for at least three weeks and urged residents to stay home as much as possible.
The county exempted religious services and protests from the order, citing constitutional protections in an apparent acknowledgment of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling this week that rejected New York state’s restrictions on churches and synagogues.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, dismissed the top court’s decision as “irrelevant,” saying it was narrowly tailored to specific areas no longer subject to the limits.
But the ruling could drive legal challenges against similar limits placed on houses of worship in other states, including California.
“It is fair to say that this Supreme Court ruling has broader implications and governors would be wise to be guided by it in any attempts to single out houses of worship for disparate treatment,” Randy Mastro, lead attorney for the Catholic Archdiocese of Brooklyn in the case, told Reuters.
Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said this week her latest COVID-19 restrictions on gatherings also applied to indoor religious services, reducing the maximum number of worshippers from 100 to 50 people.
Americans already weary from eight months of lockdowns began the holiday season on Friday under pressure to stay home, avoid gatherings and curtail Christmas shopping.
One day after the nation marked a low-key Thanksgiving, malls and retailers imposing strict COVID-19 rules saw fewer shoppers for the traditional Black Friday start of holiday shopping.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Saturday reported 12,999,664 cases of new coronavirus, an increase of 176,572 cases from its previous count, and said the number of deaths had risen by 1,283 to 263,956.
The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19, caused by the new coronavirus, as of 4 pm ET on Nov. 27 versus its previous report a day earlier.
The CDC figures do not necessarily reflect cases reported by individual states.
Main Photo: A highway sign along state HWY 99 in California’s Central Valley, encourages people to help stop the novel coronavirus in Merced, California, USA. EPA-EFE/PETER DASILVA
